Remote patient monitoring (RPM) technology continues to make strides improving healthcare outcomes by combining wearable sensors with mobile apps linked to artificial-intelligence-driven, cloud-based monitoring software. Sensoria Health recently announced a new RPM product developed with Defender to reduce the risk of foot amputations for people with diabetes.
Foot Defender powered by Sensoria works by monitoring patient rehab compliance. According to Dr. David C. Armstrong, Professor of Surgery at USC Keck School of Medicine, “Usually subjects with diabetic foot ulcerations wear their offloading devices in just 28% of their daily steps. And there is strong evidence that uncomplicated plantar ulcers can be healed in 8 to 12 weeks. Yet current standard of care in U.S. clinical trials have a 76% treatment failure rate at 12 weeks.”
According to Defender, the Foot Defender boot reduces average foot contact pressure by up to 50%. The boot can’t help if patients don’t wear it. A smart camera built into the boot tracks patient compliance and transmits the data to a mobile app. The app gives patients real-time feedback and encouragement for sticking to their doctor’s prescribed protocol. The app also sends data to Sensoria Dashboard, a cloud-based clinical dashboard. The data includes the percentage of time the patient wears the boot. Finally, the dashboard tracks the time the physician spends monitoring the patient, a record the physician uses to substantiate billing for remote patient monitoring. According to Sensoria, Medicare covers the cost of the boot, monthly service fees, and physician reimbursement.
