The latest report from the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion (NCCDPHP) is an eye-opening realization on the severity of the issue regarding hypertension, or high blood pressure, in America. Nearly 50% of adults in the United States have blood pressure that is higher than normal — approximately 116 million people. Of that group, three in four do not effectively manage their blood pressure.
When you isolate the section of the population that relies on Medicare, hypertension is even more common among this group. Nearly half of all Medicare recipients have higher-than-normal blood pressure.
The impact of hypertension in America is significant. High blood pressure is one of the leading causes of death and disability in the United States. It is also the leading cause of preventable deaths, indicating that there is massive room for improvement in how we address this issue from a healthcare perspective.
Also known as “the silent killer” due to a lack of visible symptoms, hypertension is a major risk factor for heart disease and stroke. In 2020, more than 670,000 deaths in the U.S. were reported with hypertension as a primary or contributing cause. It can also lead to other chronic conditions, such as kidney disease and dementia.
The Advantages of Remote Patient Monitoring for Treating Hypertension
There are many benefits to utilizing remote patient monitoring (RPM) for hypertension. With the help of RPM tools, providers can more effectively monitor and manage their patients’ blood pressure levels as well as identify heightened risk factors for other diseases.
Treatment for high blood pressure is often continuous and requires a consistent level of adherence to the prescribed treatment plan, which may include lifestyle and dietary habits, and regular use of a remote patient monitoring device. This places a large responsibility on patients to maintain their treatment and make daily, health-conscious choices. As we know from the CDC, nearly 75% of patients with high blood pressure do not take the necessary actions to manage it.
RPM, as part of a more comprehensive program for chronic care management, helps alleviate some of this responsibility from patients. It does so by supplying a real-time blood pressure monitoring service to providers with actionable data for more timely and effective interventions.
With more frequent, consistent patient-provider communication, the conversations can become proactive rather than reactive. This positions providers as trusted guides to help maintain healthy decision making and medication adherence.
Cost-Effective Solutions for Treating Hypertension
Caring for chronic diseases comes with a substantial economic burden on both patients and health systems. Due to the need for ongoing care and medication, and the frequency with which hypertension leads to medical emergencies — this can be one of the more costly chronic diseases for both patients and healthcare institutions.
According to a 2021 study on Economic Evaluations of Remote Patient Monitoring for Chronic Disease, RPM was found to be a highly cost-effective strategy for managing high blood pressure. This systematic overview, primarily from the perspective of healthcare systems, comprised 34 studies on various levels of cost analysis (cost utility, cost effectiveness, cost minimization, and cost benefit).
“Given that chronic diseases are often associated with recurrent hospitalizations and decreased quality of life (QOL), RPM has the potential to reduce these effects and improve overall disease management.”
RPM for hypertension allows health providers to stay in tune with their patients’ health needs. By keeping a watchful eye on blood pressure levels and other vital signs, RPM helps increase the likelihood that patients receive the right care at the right time and helps prevent a medical emergency. In doing this, it also correlated to a reduced number of hospital visits and readmissions.
TimeDoc Health’s Chronic Care Management Program
Through our chronic care management (CCM) services, our care management team becomes an extension of your staff to provide functional and efficient care coordination. CCM enables care coordination and delivery outside of regular office visits that aim to help patients achieve a better quality of life and more effectively manage their hypertension. Patients with hypertension are often limited in their everyday lives, bringing tremendous value to having an accessible, convenient source for medical guidance.
CCM care providers assess all possible patient challenges (such as transportation, language barriers, and cognitive impairments) to develop a thorough care plan. These providers work to improve access to care, adherence to treatment plans, and care team communication.
Our suite of CCM services includes the following:
- Staff Augmentation
Many healthcare organizations do not have the capacity to provide the virtual care needed for chronic care management. Our team of medically trained care managers are a remote extension of each practice to coordinate care. - Turnkey Marketing
Expand the awareness of your program by proactively reaching out to patients. We use a multichannel approach to maximize your program’s awareness. - Enrollment Services
Our team helps you evaluate patients for your CCM program and increase enrollment through phone-based, direct-to-patient contact. These services take care of educating patients, obtaining consent, and mailing out care plans, ensuring Medicare compliance. - TimeDoc Health Advantage
Our hybrid model can minimize your upfront costs by taking on all the care coordination your healthcare organization cannot handle independently. You can scale this service up and down as you desire to achieve the optimal balance between revenue and workload.
Get in Touch
Find out more about how TimeDoc Health helps medical organizations increase efficiencies, reduce unnecessary costs and improve hypertension outcomes.
Request a demo today to speak with one of our team members and learn how we can support your patients, your staff, and your business.