Telehealth & Wearable Devices: Monitoring Health Data Remotely
If you’re a healthcare provider, then you would probably be thinking about starting virtual care delivery for your patients, right?
Well, you must be influenced by the lucrative benefits custom telemedicine software development offers to your practice. From increasing the scope to scale your healthcare practice to data-backed decision-making, telehealth gives you all the reasons to switch to virtual care delivery.
However, in the view of taking your practice digital, you certainly start a custom telemedicine software development process, but there is a significant part of the virtual care delivery that many healthcare providers ignore.
Yes, telehealth remote monitoring is something that many healthcare practices often ignore, when it comes to starting their virtual care practice. Without remote monitoring and the custom telehealth platform’s integration with health-monitoring wearable devices, you can only consult on the basis of the conversation with the patient.
And being a healthcare provider you know the role data plays in delivering accurate and holistic care.
Furthermore, telehealth and wearable tech can be your best friends, driving the success of your digital healthcare practice.
In this blog, let’s see the benefits of wearable health technology for healthcare and the challenges in integrating wearable devices with telehealth.
So, without further ado, let’s get started!
The Basics of Telehealth and Wearable Integration
Download Free eBookThe Power of Wearable Devices in Healthcare
In a traditional setting, your diagnosis process involves collecting health vitals and undergoing some tests to identify the disease or condition. On the contrary, in telehealth, the data is collected using the integration of wearable tech with remote health monitoring.
Let’s take the example of a wearable such as a smartwatch. This watch is connected to your smartphone and collects data on your important health vitals such as heart rate, blood pressure, sleep pattern, etc. This data is then transmitted to the healthcare providers’ system for analysis in real-time. This allows healthcare providers, as well as patients, to always keep a tab on their health. Along with that, with access to patients’ real-time health vitals, the healthcare provider can easily choose a holistic way of delivering care.
There are several wearable devices in the market, but choosing the right one that collects more accurate data is what you need to deliver optimum care. That is why it is suggested that only FDA-approved wearable devices be used, which ensures not only the accuracy but also the reliability of the devices.
The primary benefit of wearable devices for telemedicine is that it makes it easier for healthcare providers to identify diseases and take necessary measures to prevent them. This empowers your practice to offer better preventive care and make the most out of the available resources.
How to Integrate Wearable Devices for Telehealth Program
Book Your Free ConsultationIntegrating Wearable Data into Telehealth Platform
To offer virtual care delivery to patients using telehealth remote monitoring, the role of wearable devices, interoperability, and seamless data transfer are extremely important. As we all know, wearable devices collect health vitals data, which is then transferred to healthcare providers’ systems for which interoperability is necessary.
However, when the data is at rest and in transmission, there is a high chance of the data being lost or stolen. To ensure the integrity of your virtual healthcare practice and continuous health tracking devices, robust security measures need to be taken.
You can go through the NIST cybersecurity framework, which the US government recommends to abide by the regulations set for proper and ethical use of technology. It will take you through all the security measures that you need to follow to ensure your software is safe to use and the data is not tampered with when it transits or at rest. Along with this, it will provide you with all the necessary compliances that your telehealth software integrated with wearable devices needs to comply with; some of these necessary compliances include HIPAA compliance certification and ISO 27001 certification.
Apart from that, some of the major benefits of real-time data monitoring for healthcare providers include helping them opt for a holistic way to deliver care, which will make the healthcare journey more personalized. Last but not least, with the integration of advanced technologies like AI and machine learning, healthcare providers can easily analyze the data collected from wearable devices, which will speed up the entire care delivery process, allowing healthcare providers to deliver better care with accurate analysis, leading to improved patient outcomes.
Enhancing Patient Care with Wearable Data
One of the most crucial aspects of patient care is patient engagement. Though many healthcare providers doubt the effectiveness of patient engagement in virtual care delivery, on the contrary, it enhances patient engagement in ways surpassing our expectations.
For instance, continuous health tracking devices give patients the freedom to proactively track their health vitals to track their progress. This tracking of the health process empowers patients to adhere to the treatment plans and make necessary lifestyle changes to improve health outcomes.
Apart from that, the relevance and potential of telehealth remote monitoring have become an integral part of remote patient monitoring and chronic care management programs. Since telehealth closes the gap between consultation and wearable devices to solve the problem of real-time health monitoring, it provides enough room for healthcare providers to continuously monitor their patient’s health and provide effective care to help them improve their health outcomes.
Another benefit of integrating telehealth and wearable tech is that it empowers healthcare providers to provide personalized care. For instance, the data collected from wearable devices allows healthcare providers to identify the gaps in care and analyze that data to deliver personalized to improve health outcomes.
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Book a DemoOvercoming Challenges in Wearable Data Integration
Integrating telehealth and wearable tech is easier said than done. There are a lot of challenges in integrating wearable devices with telehealth, majorly being data standardization and interoperability. Since the wearable devices will collect the data in a very different format and standard, it is important for your custom telehealth platform to understand and correctly interpret the data for healthcare providers to understand.
Furthermore, it is important for your custom telehealth platform to achieve interoperability with the wearable devices to seamlessly exchange data with each other. However, another concern that arises here is data privacy and user education. For instance, if the user has little to no knowledge about how to collect data and transmit it to the provider’s system, then every effort will be useless.
Here, as a healthcare provider, it becomes your responsibility to ensure the data safety of your patients and that the data that you are collecting is being used for ethical use, which is here to provide healthcare services. If you have gone through the certification and compliance requirements mentioned earlier their, you would have already been equipped with the knowledge of overcoming these data security challenges related to wearable data integration with custom telemedicine platforms.
On the other hand, when the data is at rest and being transmitted, there is a high chance of cyberthreats emerging. That is why it is recommended that robust and best security practices be implemented during the custom telemedicine software development process.
The Future of Telehealth and Wearable Devices
Technology is evolving with every passing day and that is dictating the trends in the wearable devices market. Some of the most emerging trends in wearable technology are biomarkers and implantable devices. These remote monitoring devices offer more flexibility and liberty to patients to freely collect and transmit data.
On the other hand, the data collected from wearable devices can also be used to improve population health management. As the data are used to identify trends in patients’ health patterns, they can be used to enhance the health of a particular population where proper preventive measures can be taken to enhance care practices for everyone involved.
Last but not least, the integration of wearable tech with remote health monitoring can bridge the healthcare gap for people in rural or underserved areas.
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The benefits of wearable health technology for telehealth come in a wide range, enabling providers to remotely monitor their patients. Along with that, it also comes in handy for the practice to start other healthcare programs such as remote patient monitoring and chronic care management. However, it does not end there; the major benefit of using continuous health tracking devices for telehealth remote monitoring is that it empowers the practice with data-backed healthcare practices and provides holistic care with better preventive care.
Telehealth and health monitoring wearable devices create a win-win situation in the healthcare ecosystem, where better healthcare practices are encouraged while reducing the burden on healthcare providers. So, what are you waiting for? Click here to get started with your custom telemedicine software development process.
Frequently Asked Questions
Telehealth and wearable devices raise legal and regulatory concerns. Key considerations include:
- Data Privacy: Protecting sensitive health information collected and transmitted during telehealth consultations and through wearable devices.
- Licensure and Practice Standards: Ensuring healthcare providers are licensed in the states where they practice and adhere to professional standards.
- Device Regulation: Ensuring wearable devices meet safety and accuracy standards set by regulatory bodies like the FDA.
- Informed Consent: Obtaining clear consent from patients for telehealth services and data collection through wearables.
- Reimbursement: Determining appropriate reimbursement for telehealth services and wearable device data.
Integrate wearable data into patient charts using EHR systems with compatible APIs. Ensure data security and privacy. Clearly label and timestamp wearable data. Train staff to interpret and utilize this data for informed decision-making, improving patient care and outcomes.
Healthcare providers need training in telehealth platforms, communication skills, and patient privacy. They must understand wearable device data interpretation, integration into patient records, and potential technical issues. Effective training ensures safe and efficient telehealth and wearable device utilization.
Build trust in remote monitoring by:
- Open communication: Clearly explain the process, benefits, and data security measures.
- Regular check-ins: Maintain consistent contact, address concerns promptly, and personalize interactions.
- Demonstrate value: Show how data improves care, empowers patients, and leads to better outcomes.
- Respect privacy: Ensure data confidentiality and transparently communicate its use.
- Build rapport: Foster a supportive relationship through empathy and understanding.
Reimbursement challenges for telehealth and wearable devices include: inconsistent coverage policies across payers, difficulty determining appropriate reimbursement rates for virtual services, complex coding and billing requirements, and lack of evidence on the cost-effectiveness of wearable device data.
To ensure data interoperability, adopt standardized data formats (like FHIR), use common communication protocols (e.g., Bluetooth, Wi-Fi), and establish secure data exchange mechanisms. Prioritize open APIs and promote collaboration between device manufacturers and telehealth platforms.
