Use of a Telematics Device for Daily Monitoring of Vital Signs in Home-care Patients With Advanced Cancer

BACKGROUND

The overloading of healthcare facilities and the need to prevent the risk of infection during Covid-19 emergency have highlighted the need to implement significant changes in the organization and delivery of healthcare services, mainly when these are aimed at the most fragile segments of the population, as in the case of palliative care. In order to assist with an efficient program of home palliative care for an increasing number of patients, scientific evidence is progressively underlining the need to integrate telemedicine intervention into home care protocols. The introduction of telemonitoring systems in home palliative care aims to facilitate more effective patient care, reducing both emergency room and hospital admissions and improving symptoms of distress, anxiety, and depression in patients and caregivers. Self-monitoring also increases patients' awareness by making them feel part of their care pathway and active contributors to their well-being.

Telemonitoring mainly uses medical devices to record parameters relating to the patient's state of health or treatment progress. Once registered, the data are shared on a cloud platform and then viewed by the physician, who can intervene in real-time in the event of clinically significant anomalies reported by the system.

In the panorama of medical devices used for this purpose in Italy, there is ButterfLife® (VST Srl, Modena Italy), a medical device similar to a joypad, designed by the Unimore spinoff VST (Vital Signal in a Touch), which, thanks to special sensors, allows to measure simultaneously the five primary vital parameters defined by the WHO in 90 seconds (heart rate, respiratory rate, blood oxygenation, blood pressure and body temperature). To record these parameters, the patient has to place both hands on the device, and the data collected are immediately transmitted to a portal whose software (VST-FIVE) calculates the vital signs and allows visualization the sharing with the doctor via a Wi-Fi network. In this way, it is possible to ensure early detection of worsening and failure of the health state enabling a timely activation of appropriate intervention in the home setting. The recorded data remains available for subsequent evaluation, long-term monitoring, and offline analysis.

In the present study, the ANT Foundation proposes to evaluate the feasibility and outcomes of a daily monitoring model of five vital signs (heart rate, respiratory rate, blood oxygenation, blood pressure and body temperature) conducted through the ButterfLife medical device in cancer patients assisted at home with cardiovascular and respiratory comorbidities.