COVID-19: CompuGroup Medical provides telemonitoring to relieve hospitals 

COVID-19 patients who remain in home quarantine after inpatient hospital treatment can be treated further and their vital signs are monitored. For other patients, hospitalization may be reduced or may even be prevented completely. This is ensured by a telemonitoring system that CompuGroup Medical SE (CGM) is currently introducing in Italy via its lately acquired company H&S Qualità nel Software SpA. H&S has more than 20 years of experience in this segment and already several Italian hospitals as users. Subsequently it is planned to roll out the system in Germany and other countries. As part of a monitoring system, the H&S Health Platform enables recording vital parameters wirelessly, transmit them to practitioners and alert them immediately in case of an emergency. The software is a certified medical device and has been in use for many years.

"The opportunity of remote monitoring and thus avoiding the hospitalization of patients who are infected but not in a critical state frees up more hospital beds for patients with a particularly severe course of disease," describes Hannes Reichl, Board Member Clinical & Social Care of CompuGroup Medical. "This is the reason why CGM enhanced telemonitoring solutions under the CGM SMART HOME product family."

Patients are using the H&S Health Platform application with an internet-enabled smartphone. A pulse oximeter measures heartbeat and oxygen saturation on a regular basis. If desired, a blood pressure monitor provides additional data. The devices transmit their measurements to the smartphone via Bluetooth and from there to the hospital or doctor's practice. Patients can provide additional data manually via the app. If necessary, the app reminds the patient to take the measurements.

Via a web platform, the practitioner can survey the parameters of his patients in real time as well as set the measurement frequency, the parameters to be monitored and threshold values. If the measured values are outside these thresholds, the system sends an alert immediately to the assigned hospital or general practitioner’s practice. Additionally, CGM has established a teleconsultation solution, which allows video communication between doctor and patient. This also helps to protect the health of medical staff and other patients by reducing direct contact with infected patients.

"In this crisis we are experiencing that telemedicine is becoming an important pillar in health care," comments Frank Gotthardt, Chairman of the Management Board and CEO of CompuGroup Medical SE. "Telemonitoring helps to protect healthcare providers, relieves them in their important work and saves urgently needed resources for life-threatened patients in hospitals.”