The West Wireless Health Institute, a San Diego-base medical research organization, is collaborating with Corventis, Inc., to launch the institutes first clinical research program. The new program will look into how to lower hospital readmissions among heart disease patients.
Congestive heart failure is one of the leading reasons for patient admittance to hospitals. Studies estimate that close to 27 percent of those suffering from the disease are readmitted to a care facility within a month after being discharged.
"Congestive heart failure is one of the largest and most problematic diagnoses in medicine today, with a tremendous toll on the quality of life of patients and an enormous economic burden to the country," said Eric J. Topol, chief medical officer of the WWHI. "But fortunately, heart failure is prototypic for remote wireless monitoring. Through innovative wireless sensor technologies that use smartphones and broadband communication, we have the new capability of early and rapid detection of key parameters with a simple disposable smart 'band aid' that can relay the data on a continuous basis through the Internet."
A remote wireless monitoring system, designed by Corventis, monitors vital signs that include heart rhythm, status of fluids and respiratory rate of multiple patients. This technology has allowed the WWHI to begin a randomized clinical trial.
"This unprecedented combination of clinical research and wireless engineering represents a phenomenal change in the way we will administer and experience healthcare moving forward," said Don Jones, the institute's chief wireless officer and vice president of health and life sciences at Qualcomm. "This research program will develop revolutionary new methods to create more efficient and less expensive individualized healthcare and will enable wireless sensors and remote monitoring technologies, like those from Corventis, to become much more pervasive."
The sites included in the trial will be supported by the National Institutes of Health Clinical Translation Science Award National Consortium. CTSA consists of 38 academic medical facilities in the United States
The trial will work toward decreasing the number of readmissions for heart disease patients through the clinical validation and improvement of wireless technologies.
