Continuous monitoring tools could save hospitals $20,000 per bed, report says
Contact-free continuous monitoring, a platform that taps into sensors to measure patients vital signs and other metrics, hold the promise to save health systems $15 billion a year.
That’s according to a new peer-reviewed paper published in Critical Care Medicine.
CFCM is used to monitor heartbeat, respiratory rate, ulcers and patient motion. The technology's components include sensors placed under a patient's mattress or in a chair, bedside monitor, central display station and in handheld devices.
The sensors measure vibration and calculate motion, heartbeats per minute and breaths per minute, which detect any changes from regular patterns. If a patient's status changes, the platform alerts nurses through large screens set up in conspicuous locations, as well as handheld devices.
Researchers from Harvard School of Medicine in a new Frost and Sullivan report entitled "Finding Top-Line Opportunities in a Bottom-Line Healthcare Market" claimed each hospital bed monitored with the EarlySense CFCM approach enables hospitals to achieve a cost savings nearing $20,000.
The cost savings are attributed to clinical outcome improvements published by hospitals implementing CFCM. Evidence suggests the technology can assist clinicians in earlier detection of patient deterioration, helping to reduce patient length of stay, minimize use of intensive care units, reduce falls and pressure ulcers and avoid cardiac and respiratory arrests.
The $15 billion figure was arrived at by extending the savings to all 750,000 relevant beds in the U.S. hospital system. The estimate does not take into account those patients in beds outside the hospital setting.
Clinical data also estimates that use of EarlySense has the annual potential to reduce patient falls by 301,809; reduce pressure ulcers by over 1 million; slash ICU days by about 1.7 million; eliminate more than 259,000 "Code Blue" events; and avoid close to 208,000 deaths.
"The healthcare industry is constantly working to improve efficiency," said Charlie Whelan, Frost and Sullivan's Transformational Health North America consulting director, in a statement. "These studies show that continuous monitoring presents a unique opportunity to create both top and bottom line benefits, while simultaneously improving quality of care."
Twitter: @JELagasse
