Telehealth and COPD: meta-study shows little QoL improvement

May 4, 2016 | by

A review of studies on the use of telehealth interventions (generally remote patient monitoring but also education and pulmonary rehabilitation) with COPD patients is equivocal to somewhat negative on the effectiveness of telehealth on quality of life (QoL) improvement and positive impact on disease progression. Only three of the 18 studies surveyed showed statistically significant improvements, with the others showing no significant improvement. However, the researchers noted the low number of studies and that large-scale controlled trials would be called for; also at the end, they note that what might be more valid is the “comparison to absence of deterioration, relative to control groups, as a perhaps more realistically acceptable success criterion.” Stasis might be a better thing to evaluate given that COPD patients can deteriorate quickly without the right care. Published by a Danish research team at the International Journal of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease.  Dove Press open access. Also FierceHealthIT

A collation of recent items received – something for everyone

May 11, 2015 | by

Thanks to Professor Mike Short, Mike Clark and Dr Nicholas Robinson, the following are items that have been drawn to the attention of this editor, plus a few he spotted himself:

We begin with a post from Dr Richard Windsor, aka Radio Free Mobile, a person whose opinions I greatly respect, arguing that Fitbit has chosen the perfect moment to float.

Next is an invitation to a Healthcare App – Peer to Peer Session at Swansea University on 20th May at The Institute of Life Science 2 – attendance is free, booking is here. Hours are stated  as 10.45 am – 12.00pm (ie noon).

Then we have a gentle reminder for the Royal Society of Medicine’s event on the 4th June entitled “Should patients manage their own care records?” As the RSM is a charity, our charges for a whole day of excellent speakers are a tiny fraction of what a commercial event would charge, and there’s no hustling.

After that we have the latest Morgan Stanley North American Insight, summarised as saying (more…)