Doctors in the British country use new technologies to help patients with severe lung diseases receive treatment from their homes.
Expert doctors funded by the government of Scotland and the United Kingdom are using state-of-the-art technology to remotely monitor patients with a chronic and possibly fatal condition. The search for a solution to treat chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) is a matter of urgency, as it affects 1.2 million people in the United Kingdom alone.
In 2018, the board of directors of the Glasgow Public Health System approved a five-year digital strategy, which includes treatments backed with Artificial Intelligence to treat COPD. In this first test, patients are provided with a portable mask that collects vital data and subsequently sends it remotely to the doctors in charge of the specific cases.
To achieve this and subsequent tests, the Scottish Health Service has been based on Azure cloud technology, developed by Microsoft. In addition, the KenSci machine learning software will be used to collect and interpret medical information.
Once the pilot is in operation, the medical staff will be able to see the information reported by the patient, as well as the physiological data obtained from portable devices and breathing machines.
Patients and doctors can communicate through the cloud platform, and consultants can exchange opinions remotely through an online portal. The algorithms are able to track and anticipate when an outbreak is likely to occur and alert doctors, so they can take action and reduce the need for emergency hospitalizations.
"Avoiding hospital admission is a priority for patients with COPD and has a significant impact on the health service, which is struggling to cope with increased demand." Declares David Lowe, emergency consultant for the British National Health Service, and continues: “It has an impact on the patient's well-being and costs an average of 6,000 pounds per admission. We could have delivered the same key interventions with antibiotics and steroids to the patient at home days before if we had seen his bad condition. "
The ability to collect data at home, instead of having to attend hospital appointments, means less travel for the patient, and also a lower risk of worsening or contagion. At the same time, it reduces the number of appointments canceled in the hospital and frees up the doctor's time.
The commitment to Digital Health by the British government is helping to speed up hospital processes, but also to improve the health of patients. The use of mobile devices that monitor the state of health at home promises a path of medical care that relies much more on prevention than on the care of complications or acute events.
As soon as the technology is proven, it will be very easy to start implementing it in other parts of the world with the knowledge and learning acquired in this first stage, another of the great benefits that Digital Health provides.
COPD is a prevalent reality and it is estimated that 64 million people suffer from this condition in the world and by 2030 it will be the fourth leading cause of death; In Latin America, according to the PLATINO study (Latin American Pulmonary Obstruction Research Project) the prevalence of COPD in various cities of the region was evaluated, finding a rate of 19.7% for Montevideo, Uruguay, 16.9% for Santiago, Chile, 15.8% for São Paulo, Brazil, 12.1% for Caracas, Venezuela and 7.8% for Mexico City.
