Coviu & The Clinician
New integrated telehealth solution supports GPs with safe and efficient remote COVID-19 patient monitoring.
Coviu, Australia’s leading telehealth solution, has partnered with AI-driven health monitoring platform, The Clinician, to launch an integrated telehealth and remote patient monitoring (RPM) solution for the management of COVID-19 patients. The solution equips GPs and practice nurses with the ability to remotely monitor patients and conduct virtual consultations using a hospital-at-home care model.
Using the platform, clinicians can enroll their patients into a purpose-built COVID-19 digital solution, enabling the collection of key vitals such as temperature, blood oxygen saturation levels, as well as subjective patient-reported outcomes like chills, coughing, muscle aches and other symptoms through a simple mobile phone application.
The combined solution enables a GP or practice nurse to not only remotely monitor their patients, but also consult with patients via a video call as required.
This technology is designed to support GPs and practice nurses with the new challenges presented by COVID-19, and not only enable them to do their jobs in a time-efficient manner, but keep them safe from infection as well. By remotely caring for patients in their home, this technology will also help stop the spread within the community.
The future of remote patient monitoring
The pandemic has brought into sharp focus the need to harness and leverage digital tools and technologies for remote patient monitoring. According to research, the global remote patient monitoring systems market is projected to be worth over $1.7 billion by 2027, up nearly 128% from the current market opportunity.
This remote patient monitoring is supported at a federal level, with the government recently announcing a $180m primary health package to support COVID-19 cases at home. As part of that package, funding for the distribution of medical devices, called pulse oximeters, that support the patient’s vital signs was announced.
With demand for primary care already at extraordinarily high levels, it will be impossible for GP practices to monitor these patients through home visits on top of their regular duties. Telehealth and remote patient monitoring to the rescue.
“As we open up our borders, new strains of COVID-19 will continue to reach our shores and an expected 8-10% of our population will be sensitive to an infection despite being vaccinated. For the most part, patients will have minor symptoms, but it’s important that we maintain a high level of remote patient monitoring to ascertain and capture serious cases early to prevent hospitalisation,” says Dr Silvia Pfeiffer, CEO and co-founder of Coviu.
Leveraging technology to unlock new methods of COVID-19 care
With this solution from Coviu and The Clinician, GPs and practice nurses have access to a monitoring dashboard containing real-time patient responses and outcomes. They can check in on patients using telehealth or just monitor the development of their symptoms on a dashboard. By accessing this data, medical practitioners can identify and prioritise the most at-risk patients, enabling urgent and personalised interventions.
“It’s critical that we support our GPs and practice nurses with the ongoing challenges presented by COVID-19 through technology, not only to enable them to do their jobs, but to keep them safe from infection as well. By caring for patients in their own homes, we can also help to stop the spread of infection within the community,” adds Dr Ron Tenenbaum, CEO of The Clinician.
This solution also alerts medical practitioners when a patient’s vital signs are outside the normal parameters. We know that underreporting by patients is commonplace so using this technology eliminates the need for patients to identify how they’re feeling and instead leverages technology for support.
In this way, patients can feel comforted knowing that their health is constantly being monitored by the relevant healthcare practitioners, who have up-to-date intel on their condition and can make informed decisions on when to escalate their care.
“By taking a holistic approach to healthcare using remote patient monitoring, the healthcare sector can activate timely interventions, reduce readmissions and better allocate resources according to a patient’s risk. By leaning on integrated technologies, a patient can feel as continuously monitored in the comfort of their home as they would be if they were admitted to hospital,” concludes Dr Pfeiffer.
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Download the Press Release here.
About Coviu
Coviu is Australia’s most trusted video telehealth solution, powering secure and feature-rich video consultations. In 2020, 60,000+ Coviu users offered over 3 million healthcare video consultations across the country. To date, Coviu has delivered over 5.5 million healthcare video consultations to 65,000+ users, partly via the Healthdirect video call platform which is a Coviu customer.
Coviu aims to improve healthcare accessibility for all, and allow both patients and providers to discover the benefits of video consultations such as cost and time savings, reduced no-shows, improved patient satisfaction and greater flexibility.
About The Clinician
The Clinician is a digital health leader, redefining how healthcare is measured and delivered. The Clinician’s cloud-based platform, ZEDOC, enables healthcare providers to manage patient-reported health data outside traditional clinical settings and transform slow, inefficient care processes through digitalisation.
Tightly integrated with health information systems, ZEDOC supports timely exchange of health data and information between providers and patients, including subjective patient-reported measures (PROMs and PREMs), objective wearable / device data, and important communication or educational materials.