INFORMING FUTURE GUIDELINES AND POLICY FROM THE PATIENTS' PERSPECTIVE ON CARDIAC IMPLANTABLE ELECTRONIC DEVICE REMOTE MONITORING: A MASTERS PROJECT FINAL RESULTS

Abstract

The clinical indications for Cardiac Implantable Electronic Device (CIED) implantation are expanding. This necessitates increased clinic resources to manage patient follow-up. Remote monitoring (RM) is a technology that transmits CIED data from patients’ home to clinic. Current evidence suggests that RM is a safe alternative to in-clinic follow-up, and is often recommended as a safety measure for CIED advisories. With the proven safety of RM, a paradigm shift to exclusive RM has been suggested. To date, there is little evidence regarding the patients’ perspective and experience while on RM. Accreditation Canada mandates that all aspects of health care planning, delivery, and evaluation be patient and family centred. Purpose: To acquire knowledge regarding the patient perspective on RM and to better understand their level of confidence and satisfaction with this emerging technology. Telephone questionnaires were conducted with 101 CIED patients who were registered on RM. A standard descriptive statistical analysis was completed, and Spearman correlations were used to assess the association between items of ordinal response options. Post remote transmission communication is very important to patients. Patients expressed increased comfort coming to clinic for devices issues only, as evidenced by knowledge of when to contact clinic and a higher level of perceived safety while on RM. However, the number of patients who perceive that their device prevents a stroke or heart attack is of concern. Study results will assist future guideline and policy developers to ensure practice remains patient and family centered as we move toward exclusive RM.