The use of telemedicine in intensive care units doesn't improve patients' risk of death or length of stay, according to a report published in the December issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association, but that finding alone appears unlikely to slow the implementation of telemedicine initiatives. For starters, the technology has many broad-based applications, mostly outside the ICU. And, as the study's authors make clear, evaluating the effectiveness of telemedicine is a challenging task that will require additional research.
The study found that observed hospital mortality rates were 12 percent in the pre-intervention period and 9.9 percent in the post-intervention period, according to a Healthcare IT News report. After adjustment for severity of illness, there were no noteworthy differences associated with the telemedicine intervention for hospital mortality. ICU mortality rates were 9.2 percent in the pre-intervention period and 7.8 percent in the post-intervention period, a difference also not considered significant following adjustment.
While these findings may warrant consideration in determining the technology's capacity for easing the intensivist shortage, it's important to note the fine print. As Erika J. Yoo, MD, and R. Adams Dudley, MD, of the University of California, San Francisco, wrote in their accompanying editorial to the study: "Given the heterogeneity of tele-ICU systems and the hospitals adopting them, it is unlikely that any single study can definitely address the benefits of telemedicine for the critically ill. Rather, literature syntheses will be the most important approach to improving the understanding of the effects of tele-ICU support."
They added that if future studies include more description of which components of ICU care were present before tele-ICU and which were added, it would be easier to interpret the results.
HealthcareGoesMobile.com wants to know if this study has affected your healthcare organization's assessment of telemedicine technology? Do the results fall in line with your experiences utilizing tele-ICU support systems?
John Farrell participates in HealthcareGoesMobile.com as a community correspondent through Intel's paid sponsorship with MedTech Publishing Company.
