Background

The incidence of heart failure is rising, with more than 26 million affected annually in Europe and the United States. Heart failure is a complex, chronic condition, with many of these patients being implanted with an implantable cardioverter defibrillator (ICD) to prevent sudden cardiac death. The disorder causes disability, depression, and reduced quality of life, and the risk of hospitalisation and mortality is high.

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Starting point and goal 

The overall aim of the project is to develop and evaluate the clinical and economic impact of a web-based, interactive care innovation that allows patients to routinely monitor their health status and symptoms of anxiety and depression and detect deterioration at an early stage. Via the platform patients will be able to engage in a dialogue with health care professionals, enabling action plans to be set up that are supported with hands-on advice and tools provided via the platform or app geared to life with a chronic disease and a device. Patients will also have the possibility of engaging with other patients via the platform.

Patient@home will especially be involved in designing, building and supporting the web-based, interactive platform, and be involved in the research team.

The project will make use of mixed-methods, including focus groups and multi-disciplinary expert panels that will also include the end users, to develop and implement the platform. The effectiveness of the platform will ultimately be tested using a randomized controlled trial design.

Expected results

We expect that the care innovation will enhance patients' health status and quality of life, increase their satisfaction with treatment, reduce hospitalizations, facilitate communication between patients and the health care professionals about patients' treatment in a shared-decision making process, and overall enable patients to live a better life with their disease and their device.

The project is funded with a grant from TrygFonden and the Lundbeck Foundation, and a seeding grant from patient@home.

Read more HERE.