The unwired hospital bed

The sight of someone you love on a hospital bed joined with tubes or wires to several monitors can be disconcerting. New technology promises to remove those wires and use one single, weightless electrode patch, which consolidates all the others and works with a radio transmitter. The name for this is “epidermal electronics” and it’s part of a growing field, called mHealth, because it uses mobile technologies.

The opportunities for mHealth are endless as so many conditions can be continually monitored from home. The Nuvant Mobile Cardiac Telemetry System can detect arrhythmias using a 5x15 cm gadget on a patient’s chest, which transmits to a nearby centre. Or sensors could be used on someone all the time to detect whether they are at risk of a heart attack. This kind of monitoring will help reduce medical costs and play a preventative role too.

For example, a study in 2008 found chronically ill patients enrolled in a “home telehealth” program in the US experienced a 25% drop in bed days of care, 19% fall in hospital visits, and the average cost was $US1,600 each, compared to $US13,121 for conventional home-based primary care. But relatively few patients are receiving this kind of care today. This may be lack of financial support for patients over 65. Or it may simply be caution about using new technologies. People will have to get used to being monitored without looking as if they are.