Casa Hospital San Juan de Dios

The increase in the prevalence of chronic diseases has changed the demand on the health system in recent years. The traditional hospital-centered care model is clearly deficient in achieving optimal control of these pathologies. In the hospital-centric radar model, the health teams contact their patients and obtain data that helps them guide their treatments; but this data, which is gathered during the meeting, constitutes a minimal percentage compared to the amount of data, related to the patient's health, which is created while they are outside the hospital's radar. In this care model, the patient has little participation in the decisions taken regarding their health, and the doctor adopts a paternalistic role. Some of the problems related to the mismanagement of these diseases arise from not following the treatment, absence of controls at the indicated times, little education of patients regarding their disease, difficulties in gaining access to an appointment with their doctor and late detection of treatment failures or due to complications arising. I believe that the failure of chronic disease control is partly due to these aspects that I have mentioned. Chronic diseases require the existence of a greater connection between patients and health teams, and that patients are included in the healthcare team, participating in decisions and becoming more involved in the management of their disease.

The advent of smartphones and wearable devices like smartwatches opened a new possibility, generating an immense amount of health data such as heart rate frequency, oxygen saturation, blood pressure, physical activity, and even heart rate, which is not incorporated into the health information systems and which are not available for the health teams to use them for decision-making.

Medical devices such as blood glucose meters for diabetic patients, blood pressure meters, devices used for the treatment of sleep apnea and many more, offer the possibility of exporting the health data obtained. This possibility could be connected to the medical history of the patients and linked to an alarm system established by their doctor. If a glucose sensor detects 3 episodes of hypoglycemia, it could trigger an alarm to their doctor and schedule a teleconsultation to adjust the treatment. The latter is just one example of how I believe technology can potentially contribute to improve oversight and adherence to treatment in patients with prevalent chronic diseases.

 Medical devices such as blood glucose meters for diabetic patients, blood pressure meters, devices used for the treatment of sleep apnea and many more, offer the possibility of exporting the health data obtained. 

Mobile applications for patients integrated with their medical records could also be a tool that contributes to educating patients about their disease, by improving access to quality information, and contributing to a more fluid communication with the treating medical team.

In conclusion, I believe that we are witnessing a shift in the care model of our patients, partly driven by a change in diseases and the need that arises from that to change the care model to achieve good results, and partly by the possibilities that technology offers us today, to access a large amount of data our patients’ health, that in my opinion, will allow us to make better decisions. Therefore it would be interesting to develop tools that allow the integration of the patient into this new model of care and contribute to a better experience of patients with prevalent chronic diseases and perhaps improve health outcomes.