Home Telemonitoring In Heart Failure: A Systematic Review And Meta-Analysis

Health Aff (Millwood). 2018 Dec;37(12):1983-1989. doi: 10.1377/hlthaff.2018.05087.

Abstract

We conducted a meta-analysis of twenty-six randomized controlled trials that tested the effectiveness of home telemonitoring in patients with heart failure for reducing mortality and hospital use. We used the PICOT framework as a tool to address an important variable not previously studied: the timing or duration of monitoring. Specifically, we found that home telemonitoring decreased the odds of all-cause mortality and heart failure-related mortality at 180 days but not at 365 days. Home telemonitoring did not significantly affect the odds of all-cause hospitalization at 90 or 180 days, or of heart failure-related hospitalization at 180 days. At 180 days, home telemonitoring significantly increased the odds of all-cause emergency department visits. Home care provision did not moderate the effects of home telemonitoring on all-cause hospitalization. Recent regulatory changes that relaxed Medicare restrictions on telehealth reimbursement make it imperative that studies fully describe outcomes (for example, heart failure-related versus all-cause hospitalizations) and deliberately test all essential intervention elements, such as intervention duration.

Publication types

  • Meta-Analysis
  • Systematic Review

MeSH terms

  • Heart Failure / mortality
  • Heart Failure / therapy*
  • Hospitalization / statistics & numerical data*
  • Humans
  • Monitoring, Physiologic / methods
  • Mortality
  • Randomized Controlled Trials as Topic
  • Telemedicine / methods*
  • Telemedicine / statistics & numerical data*
  • Time Factors