Successful remote patient monitoring programs require effective scaling efforts, integration of RPM programs into clinical workflows, and gaining buy-in from frontline clinical staff members.

How Top Hospitals Are Scaling Remote Patient Monitoring Success

The latest webinar as part of HealthLeaders' The Winning Edge series was held this week, with a pair of experts discussing the keys to success for remote patient monitoring (RPM) in the inpatient and home settings.

RPM has emerged as a powerful tool for health systems and hospitals to improve the care of patients such as enhancing the management of patients with chronic conditions with home monitoring and providing hospital care teams with alerts based on real-time data to intervene quickly when inpatients show signs of deterioration.

This week's webinar, which was titled The Winning Edge for Remote Patient Monitoring Success, featured Sarah Pletcher, MD, chief digital health officer as well as system vice president and executive medical director of strategic innovation at Houston Methodist, and Rebecca Arriaga, MPH, vice president of operations at Ochsner Digital Medicine, which is part of Ochsner Health.

Pletcher and Arriaga discussed a range of topics related to RPM, including the scaling of RPM programs, integrating RPM programs into clinical workflows, and gaining buy-in from frontline clinical staff for RPM initiatives.

How to Scale RPM Programs

Successfully scaling RPM programs involves several factors, according to the panelists.

To successfully scale an RPM program, health systems and hospitals must assemble a large coalition of key stakeholders, including clinicians, nurses, and IT teams, the panelists said. Building a coalition of stakeholders requires education about the value of RPM programs across several levels of an organization, including showing staff members how RPM programs can reduce length of stay and avoid emergency department utilization, they said.

Scaling efforts must be embraced by an organization's senior leadership such as the CEO, CMO, and CNO, and senior leaders must be convinced of the importance of having an RPM program, the panelists said.

Scaling RPM programs also requires intentional efforts in change management and project management, the panelists said. These efforts should include persistence, recruiting champions, and multiple iterations of rolling out RPM programs, they said.

Integrating RPM Programs into Clinical Workflows

RPM programs should be seamlessly integrated into clinical workflows for several reasons, including to promote clinician buy-in, to avoid care team alert fatigue, and to advance the application of best practices, according to the panelists.

At Houston Methodist, the health system conducts RPM on hospitalized patients using BioButton, a medical-grade wearable patch that collects vital signs and other patient biometrics. When Houston Methodist adopted BioButton, the health system already had a virtual care program that included virtual ICU, so a centralized virtual care team monitors BioButton data and ensures that bedside care teams are not overwhelmed with alerts about changes in patient status, Pletcher said.

The RPM program at Ochsner Health focuses on home-based RPM such as monitoring of patients who have chronic conditions, including hypertension and diabetes.

Ensuring that home-based RPM is integrated with clinical workflows includes making sure that acting on RPM-generated data is aligned with best practices for managing and treating chronic conditions, Arriaga said. Achieving this alignment includes conducting roundtables with clinicians on advancements in care and keeping up to date with the literature on chronic conditions such as hypertension and diabetes, she said.

Gaining Clinical Staff Buy-In

Communication with clinicians is indispensable in gaining their engagement and support in RPM programs, the panelists said.

For example, when protocols are developed for RPM programs, clinicians should be encouraged to ask questions and to participate in the decision-making process, Arriaga said. For home-based RPM programs, primary care and specialty care experts should be involved in how to move the program forward, she said.

One of the goals of adopting BioButton at Houston Methodist was to reduce the need for care team members to collect vital sign data from hospitalized patients. To gain clinician and nurse buy-in for the initiative, it was necessary to engage with those frontline caregivers to reassure them that it was safe to reduce manual collection of vital sign data and that the BioButton data was accurate, Pletcher said.

In addition, Houston Methodist generated support for BioButton adoption from frontline caregivers by highlighting how the reduction of manual collection of vital sign data frees up time for nurses and other staff members to focus on other areas of direct patient care, Pletcher said.

The Winning Edge series is an extension of theHealthLeaders Exchange program. The HealthLeaders Exchange is an exclusive, executive community for sharing ideas, solutions, and insights.