The Opportunities And Challenges For Remote Patient Monitoring

Dr. Liz Kwo outlines the landscape of the RPM space.

Used at the beginning of the pandemic mainly in the form of videoconferences and telemedicine, remote patient monitoring (RPM) is currently adopted by an increased number of physicians and sustained by several reimbursement policies issued by entities such as Centers for Medicare and Medicare Services (CMS). Although currently experiencing accelerated development, RPM still has some challenges ahead that can be overcome by efforts from several players involved in the healthcare system, such as federal government, big tech companies, providers, physicians and patients. A more recent survey, dated May 2021, indicated that 43% of clinics and hospitals interviewed believe that in the next five years in-person monitoring will be matched by remote patient monitoring, while 35% think RPM will surpass in-patient monitoring in the same time frame. These recent technologies enable providers to keep up to date with a patient's condition, with the changes that can occur in their disease evolution, and to make interventions that can decrease the number of visits to ER, reduce the rates of readmissions, and even save the lives of monitored patients. As for patients, their position regarding virtual care, RPM and health monitoring through tech devices has changed compared since the COVID-19 pandemic.