Authors' recommendations: Telehealth is a broad term used to describe the use of communication and information technologies that aim to provide healthcare at a distance. Vale of York Clinical Commissioning Group inherited a telehealth service that had failed to provide the expected benefits. They have requested an evidence briefing to inform their commissioning of telehealth services. The focus of this briefing is telehealth interventions for people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), diabetes or heart failure. Although there is a large amount of available evidence, much of it is weak and/or contradictory. However, there is good evidence that telehealth monitoring can reduce mortality in patients with heart failure, particularly those recently discharged from hospital. Studies evaluating the cost-effectiveness of telehealth generally have methodological weaknesses that limit their reliability and generalisability to NHS settings. Many of the conditions that have favoured the successful large-scale implementation of telehealth in other settings (remote populations, centralised IT infrastructure and decision-making) are not replicated in the NHS. Implementing telehealth systems more incrementally at a pace that enables greater system integration and local adaptation may offer a better chance of success than a 'big bang' approach. Monitoring resource use, patient experience and impact on clinical outcomes will be integral to any service deployment.

Project Status: Completed

Year Published: 2013

URL for published report: http://www.york.ac.uk/inst/crd/pdf/Telehealth.pdf

English language abstract: An English language summary is available

Publication Type: Not Assigned

Country: England

Organisation Name: University of York

Contact Address: University of York, York, Y01 5DD, United Kingdom. Tel: +44 1904 321040, Fax: +44 1904 321041,

Contact Name: crd@york.ac.uk

Contact Email: crd@york.ac.uk

Copyright: University of York