mHealth for cardiac patients telemonitoring and integrated care

Abstract

In the majority of developing economies there has been limitation to rapid growth of technologyrich and expensive broadband telecommunication infrastructure (e.g. optical fiber networks), which is prerequisite of e-Health. However, along with the emergence of broadband mobile communication networks, mHealth seems advantageous and costefficient mode of e-Health in those countries, likewise Georgia. The first mHealth project in Georgia on m-Telemonitoring (MTM-1) of Cardiac arrhythmia -54 patients with main medical results, Quality of Service (QoS), Quality of Experience (QoE), cost-efficiency and remaining challenges -is presented, as well as the outline of its continuation -MTM-2 project, which aims improvement of decision making for emergency cardiac patients and usage of mHealth applications for integrated care provision in remote regions of Georgia.

Rise of the machines: will heart failure become the first cyber-specialty?

“…The Chapidze Emergency Cardiology Centre in Georgia is pioneering the use of mHealth to monitor cardiac arrhythmias (irregular heartbeats) and hypertension (high blood pressure) in patients. A study carried out by the Centre and Tbilisi State Medical University into mHealth for cardiac patient telemonitoring and integrated care found that when mHealth was used to monitor cardiac arrhythmias it shortened hospital stays and had a positive impact on quality of life, because patients were able to go home sooner (110).…”

Blood4U: A Novel Approach for Blood Collection

“…In this series, Chen et al [4] presented patient monitoring use case of mHealth to highlight the new needs in terms of data access control, location awareness, prioritization and mobility levels while developing the mHealth solution. Kirtava et al [6] presented mHealth solution for cardiac patients. They reported feasible methodology to monitor cardiac arrhythmia in outpatients in Georgia, promoting earlier discharge of nonlifethreatening cases, improving patients' comfort of life and increasing their mobility with enhanced safety.…”

Deep learning for cardiac computer-aided diagnosis: benefits, issues & solutions

“…Several studies have demonstrated the positive impacts of mHealth projects towards developing nations. These benefits include, widening access to healthcare services particularly for remote communities, lowering service costs for financially challenged or resource scarce areas, promoting the dissemination of health education thereby improving disease monitoring and treatment, as well as supporting health providers by providing efficient portable tools (26,27). Telecommunication technologies, especially mobile phones have contributed greatly to the successful implementation of mHealth initiatives.…”

“…The majority of research has focused on monitoring systems which aim to detect abnormalities in patients through the integration of mobile technologies in their daily life (30,31). For instance, the pairing of a wireless heart monitor to a smartphone, and data transmission over mobile telecommunications networks would provide physicians a constant stream of reports regarding a patient's status (27,32,33). Additionally, through the use of mobile or web based applications, interaction between physician and patient can be achieved on a consistent basis regardless of distance between both parties (34,35).…”