Telemedicine, monitoring of diseases through digital platforms of permanent communication between patients and doctors, improves disease control, saves visits to the health center and decreases hospital income.They are some of the conclusions of the health and diabetes who have participated in the European Palante Telemedicine program, which has been launched in Andalusia during the last two years to improve the control of diabetes patients.This project is one of the seven pilots developed in different regions of the European Union.
The Palante Project is an application in which they register patients with diabetes and health personnel that allow each patient to register their glycemia data, their weight, blood pressure and physical activity.In addition, you can ask your GP, follow the pharmacological treatment and obtain educational material about diabetes.
3,000 diabetics, more involved with their illness
The project has focused on the follow -up of 7,000 diabetes patients although 3,000 are those who actively participated in the platform.2,000 health professionals from health centers and Andalusian hospitals have hosted this program.The conclusions of the project will be presented in Brussels next June.
Manuel Sánchez is 57 years old and suffers type 2 diabetes. He is one of the patients who participate in the program at the La Laguna Health Center, in Cádiz.“For me it is very simple.I send all my data through the computer and I avoid going so many times to the health center. ”Manuel assures the chain being that he has improved the follow -up of his illness.“Now we are morally obliged to control the disease every week.In addition, the platform sends us reminders about the measurements we have to make and the pending visits to the health center ”.
Doctors and nurses, in favor of maintaining these types of programs
Julian Correa is one of the family doctors who has consultation at the Laguna Health Center.He believes that this type of digital platforms are very necessary and should be extended to the rest of Spain."Just one click I know the messages and doubts of my patients, their diet, risk factors and I can answer you quickly," he says.
For Dr. Correa, telemedicine empowers patients and makes them more responsible about their own disease.A few meters from him, nurse Vicious Pilar, is pending every day of the data sent by the almost 40 diabetic patients who have hosted the European program.“The digital platform allows us to monitor more personalized- this health is affirmed- and have a more exhaustive control.We can act before on some incidence in the measurement of gluucemia and prevent them from having to come to the center. ”
More than 20 million Spaniards have a digital medical history, 70% of the recipes are electronic, and health applications could be prescribed as normal as a therapeutic treatment, according to experts in the sector.
New technologies applied to medicine can save up to 90,000 million euros in Europe, according to data from the latest report prepared by the AMETIC Association.
In the Spanish case, there are pending challenges such as better integrating medical records between different communities and between public and private health systems.Chronic diseases are 75% of the cost of the health system in Spain.
