Stories of prevention: the story of Ms Carla
Telemedicine is an excellent tool to help in the prevention process and to provide rapid intervention in the event of an emergency, and in this connection we tell the story of Ms. Carla: the patient had been complaining of chest pain for several days, she felt as if her heart were not beating, and she had difficulty feeling her pulse.
Ms Carla’s attending physician was unable to identify the possible cause of the discomfort through routine examinations, so he prescribed a long-term Holter ECG (over 48 hours).
Thanks to Biotechware technology, it was possible to perform the examination immediately and the Lifecard CF Holter ECG was applied to the patient, who kept it for 72 hours.
At the end of the monitoring period the recording was sent via the Cloud Platform to the Biotechware Reporting Centre where it was immediately analysed by our Cardiologists.
The Reporting Team found several pathological pauses in the tracing over the entire monitoring period, so as soon as the report was issued, the patient was notified and referred to the emergency room to evaluate pacemaker implantation.
Ms Carla was eventually rushed into emergency surgery and is now in recovery.
Thanks to Biotechware’s solution and, in particular, to the continuous monitoring of the heart’s cardiac activity, it was possible to quickly identify pathologies that otherwise would not have been found until after subsequent complications and, in this way, to intervene promptly.
Effective prevention through Telemedicine
Cardiovascular prevention is the set of measures aimed at preventing or reducing the risk of developing cardiovascular diseases.
A healthy lifestyle consisting of a proper nutrition and moderate physical activity is the basis of prevention, but cardiac screening is also very important, in particular, through basic diagnostic examinations:
- A simple resting ECG electrocardiogram is sufficient to check normal cardiac functioning and identify any abnormalities that may be the first sign of pathology.
- Palpitations, tachycardia or or feeling as if your heart is not beating. In these cases, an in-depth examination with a Holter ECG may be useful.
- In cases of unstable arterial hypertension, or where an important emotional component is suspected, Holter pressure testing can be very useful
The booking of cardiological examinations (resting ECG, Holter ECG, pressure Holter) in Italy can be made through CUP, waiting times may vary depending on the type of examination, the region of relevance and the patient’s health condition.
The examination that requires the longest waiting time is the Holter ECG; booking through CUP involves, depending on priority, a wait of 10 to 60 days, to which at least one week must be added to obtain the report.
Biotechware’s Telemedicine solution allows resting ECG, Holter ECG and Holter pressure ECG to be performed in the pharmacy, at home, in the clinic or outpatient clinic with no or minimal waiting time and with very short time reports.
This, as Ms Carla’s story shows, is very important to respond promptly in urgent cases and, in some cases, is decisive in saving the patient’s life.