An eHealth Approach for Optimal Venous Thromboembolic Disease Management

Abstract

This paper presents results obtained from the use of an e-Health monitoring system proposed for patients suffering from Thromboembolic Cardiovascular Diseases (CVD) such as Pulmonary Embolism (PE) and Deep Venous Thrombosis (DVT). Time is decisive in patients with these conditions and the faster the medical information gets seen by trained medical staff, the better it is for the patient’s health management. Unregistered or unnoticed symptoms, as well as late reaction to them may lead to major health deterioration. The main objective of the study has been to propose and test a complex Cloud based system that could improve the well-being and health outcomes for this category of patients. Using a mobile phone application, the system is designed to acquire relevant patient health data, such as heart rate/oxygen saturation, ECG and blood pressure from different sensors, then through the internet connection the data is saved into a private cloud infrastructure from which it is accessed and displayed onto the doctor's interface. During the study 31 patients used the proposed system and improved their overall health status in comparison with the control group(p<0.5). The proposed system has proven to be one that could improve health care services in such a way that it can decrease patient-doctor direct interaction while preserving in the same time a high-quality treatment