Continuous, Ambulatory, Non Invasive, Vital Sign Monitoring Using VRES of Cardiac Surgical Patients Following Discharge From Intensive Care. Impact on Detection of Physiological Deterioration

Failure to recognise deterioration early is a major cause of preventable deaths amongst hospital patients. The investigators wish to study whether continuous monitoring of 'vital signs' (pulse rate, breathing rate, and blood oxygen saturations) with computer modeled alerting to detect patient deteriorations can reduce cardiac arrest rate and critical care readmissions from the wards by alerting staff to clinical deteriorations more effectively than current paperbased systems.

Continuous monitoring of 'vital signs' can be achieved in two ways. Continuous monitoring of 'vital signs' has traditionally been restricted to the bedside because of the need for the patient to be connected by wires to the monitor.

More recently, advances in telemetry (wireless technology) have allowed the development of wearable devices which allow patients to mobilise freely, whilst constantly monitoring these 'vital signs'.