Doctors Monitor Patients' Hearts Over Internet

by Anonymous

New Brunswick, NJ May 6, 2004 -¡V A select group of patients at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital (RWJUH) in New Brunswick, NJ, are participating in a pioneering study of a new heart monitor that gets implanted in the body, collects data about the heart¡¦s condition and transmits it to physicians over the Internet.

RWJUH is one of a handful of medical centers in the nation participating in trials for the Chronicle implantable heart failure monitor, a pacemaker-size device that painlessly monitors the heart rate, intracardiac pressure and other clinical indicators of heart failure patients.

One such patient is Kathy Fredericks, 56, of Cranford, who had the device implanted in January. ¡§All I have to do is plug in the box to the phone line and press the ¡¥on¡¦ button. It automatically makes the call and sends the information.¡¨

The box is a remote monitor that hooks up to a standard telephone jack in a patient¡¦s home, or anywhere. This remote monitor transmits readings from the implantable device to a secure Internet website where clinicians can view the data and possibly spot warning signs.

¡§The device captures critical information about changes in patients¡¦ heart failure condition before they may actually feel any symptoms, allowing physicians to adjust medications or order tests sooner,¡¨ said Dr. Ronald Freudenberger, Director of the Advanced Heart Failure and Transplant Cardiology Program at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital, and the principal investigator of the hospital¡¦s Chronicle device clinical trial.

A change in blood pressure within the heart is one example of the kind of vital information the device can provide, said Dr. Freudenberger.

¡§The pressures inside a person¡¦s heart are directly connected with the symptoms of a heart failure patient, and the higher these pressures are, the more a patient feels shortness of breath, fatigue and discomfort,¡¨ he said. ¡§Normally, we would need to perform a catheterization procedure to read the heart¡¦s pressures. The Chronicle device reads these pressures continuously, and the patient can transmit the information for us to view on a secure website. It¡¦s like a virtual house call.¡¨

RWJUH currently has four patients enrolled in the study and expects to add more patients. The Internet-based monitoring component of the system, called the Medtronic CareLink„¥ Network, is approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and is currently being used by RWJUH to follow patients with various implantable cardioverter-defibrillators and cardiac resynchronization therapy devices that treat sudden cardiac arrest.