Chronic Patients and Technology

To understand the importance of teleassistance in our society, one must consider the demographic shift with the increase in life expectancy and decrease in birth rates. Spain ranks fourth in longevity among developed countries with a life expectancy of 81 years for men and 86 for women; moreover, the aging population accounts for 19% of the total population.

This aging population is accompanied by an increase in the prevalence of chronic or long-term diseases that require adequate and close monitoring by both patients and healthcare professionals. Chronic patients represent 80% of primary care consultations and 60% of hospital stays. Additionally, 40% of patients with multiple pathologies suffer from three or more chronic diseases.

In this scenario, in a growing demand for healthcare, increased integration of new technologies, and improved access to innovation, the healthcare system, aiming to guarantee access, quality, and sustainability, is shifting its focus towards chronic patients. This entails ensuring comprehensive, coordinated, and continuous care, through necessary collaboration between healthcare professionals and patients in their involvement in the appropriate use of available resources. This action is achieved by empowering the patient, meaning an engaged, responsible, well-informed patient with the means to facilitate self-care and their relationship with healthcare professionals.

Studies on the preferences of older adults show their desire to remain at home for as long as possible, for which technology aimed at active and personalized teleassistance at home is essential. In fact, there are experiences that show positive results in patients (better perception of safety, increased autonomy, and more peace of mind for the family), along with a decrease in decompensations due to worsening of their illness, fewer emergencies, and consequently, reduced consumption of healthcare resources, facilitating the promotion of healthy habits and active aging.

In this environment, technology will enable the digitization of homes, transforming the home into a care center by connecting it with the socio-health system where professionals who care for and assist patients are located. This system must be integrated locally, incorporating and interrelating all resources: home care, primary care, acute hospitals, medium and long-term hospitals, and nursing homes.

Therefore, the challenge for our socio-healthcare system is to achieve the integration of technology that allows teleassistance as an accessible resource to the population.

We must seize the current situation generated by Covid19, which has acted as an accelerator of change towards a more digital society, observing a greater acceptance of non-face-to-face medicine by patients, a destigmatization of digital, and an increase in “teleeverything”: telemedicine, telecare, telemonitoring, …, facilitating greater incorporation of technology into our daily lives.

Author: Eugeni Sedano i Monasterio PhD, Former Director of Public Affairs at ESTEVE and member of the advisory board of Onalabs.