Does a home telehealth-based cardiac rehabilitation programme reduce costs compared to a standard hospital-based programme in patients eligible for cardiac rehabilitation?
Home telehealth-based cardiac rehabilitation is more cost-effective from both provider and patient perspectives compared to standard hospital-based programs.
We conducted a cost benefit analysis of a home telehealth-based cardiac rehabilitation programme compared to the standard hospital-based programme. A total of 120 participants were enrolled in a trial, with 60 randomised to the telehealth group and 60 randomised to usual care. Participants in the telehealth group received a mobile phone, Wellness Diary and a Wellness web portal, with daily text messaging. Participants in the usual care group received the standard 6-week hospital-based outpatient cardiac rehabilitation programme, including gym sessions. The cost of delivery by telehealth was slightly lower than for patients attending a rehabilitation service in person. From the provider's perspective, the telehealth intervention could be delivered for 1633 per patient, compared to 1845 for the usual care group. From the participant's perspective, patient travel costs for home rehabilitation were substantially less than for hospital attendance (80 vs 400). Cardiac rehabilitation by telehealth offers obvious advantages and the option should be available to all patients who are eligible for cardiac rehabilitation.
Whittaker et al. (Wed,) studied this question.
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