Viewcare A/S

Internet for recovery

Denmark is the leading European country when it comes to using eHealth infrastructures. Especially concerning the treatment of COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), Denmark makes use of a trendsetting telemonitoring system for monitoring and treatment of COPD patients in their own home. This way, about 40% of treatment costs can be saved compared to stationary hospital stays. Another important aspect is the comprehensive monitoring of all relevant data via the Internet. If this monitoring is not guaranteed, sudden exacerbation of the patient‘s condition cannot be treated fast enough. The COPD telemonitoring solution developed by Viewcare in cooperation with Danish Viprinet partner Sharecon is one of the most up-to-date of its kind, and stands out by its extremely high availability.

Overview of benefits

Highly reliable monitoring solution
Mobile – easy to carry on and set up within minutes
Easy to use by individuals unfamiliar with technical devices

The task

In order for such a monitoring system to function properly, it’s important that the solution doesn’t require any special networking infrastructure in the respective COPD patient’s home. Existing landlines already installed in the patient’s home, and/or additional mobile phone connections for transmitting video conferencing sessions and patient health data often don’t meet the demands for network performance, e.g. sufficient uplink speed for landlines and reliability for mobile data links. To address these shortcomings, Viewcare has implemented Viprinet technology in its telemonitoring system. With Viprinet Multichannel VPN Routers, several mobile phone links are bonded to one virtual leased line with sufficient bandwidth, availability, and reliability.

Implementation

Via a special touch screen, the Viewcare terminal initiates a live stream with and also sends the patient’s health data to the doctor’s PC in the hospital. To achieve that, Viewcare installed a touch screen computer and a Multichannel VPN Router 300 or 500 per patient, equipped with three UMTS/HSPA+ modules. On all routers, streaming optimization was installed in order for video and data conferences to provide the necessary quality. With this setup, hundreds of patients could be connected to the telemedicine service, each within an hour.

Result

With the market-leading Viewcare solution, treating in-patients at home becomes an attractive alternative to hospital admissions, as it significantly contributes to reducing the total cost of treatment. By using Viprinet routers, Viewcare combines an intuitive touch screen terminal with a highly reliable broadband Internet connection, and the best thing is: It can be set up on a table in the patient’s home and switched on immediately, no technical expertise necessary. From an economic point of view, the combination of the Viewcare touch screen computer with Viprinet technology is especially useful for patients with acute medical conditions in need of short- or mid-term treatment, like COPD patients. A securely encrypted broadband Internet connection allows for video and data conferences between patients at home and their doctors in the hospital for check-up as well as for addressing emergencies at any time.

Customer Opinion

We supply a full range of integrated telemedicine services which have been proven in a randomized clinical trial to be both safe and effective for treating COPD patients in the comfort and safety of their own home, as an alternative to admitting them to a hospital.

Søren Hofmeister, CEO

Viewcare A/S