You may not know the word, but what it means is that the 50 percent of patients now not monitored (or properly cared for) in hospitals could soon be – and possibly, live longer – with the allocation of a dedicated wireless spectrum for medical devices.
Medical Area Body Networks, or MBANs, are wireless patient monitoring systems and according to Bethanie Hestermann, if you’re having a heart attack in a hospital and you’re not being monitored, you have a six percent chance of survival.
Pretty scary, huh? But if you were being monitored and your heart stopped, you’d have a 48 percent chance of making it.
Almost 50 percent of all patients in U.S. hospitals are not monitored, David Collins, MHA, CPHQ, CPHIMS, FHIMSS, and the senior director of mHIMSS, the mobile initiative of HIMSS, stated in a story. “MBANs provide a cost-effective way to monitor every patient in a healthcare institution, so clinicians can provide real-time and accurate data, allowing them to intervene and save lives,” he revealed.
MBANs aren’t just for monitoring patients with chronic illnesses, as they also allow healthcare providers to identify life-threatening problems or events before they occur.
Patients can also be monitored at home, which saves money by reducing readmission rates. Doctors can keep an eye on their patients when they’re home or in the car going out to dinner or just about anywhere due to the fact that the monitors can transmit data about their conditions.
Collins noted that in-home patient monitoring isn’t just for those with heart problems. “Premature babies could come home a little sooner, a father struggling with heart disease can be aware of his condition and still make his kids’ soccer game, and a grandmother living alone could stay in her home and keep her independence,” he noted.
With MBANs, physicians can intervene before a patient’s condition seriously deteriorates; resulting in less time spent in the intensive care unit and reducing costly follow-up visits.
One healthcare company estimates it could save $1.5 million per month if unplanned (emergency) transfers could be prevented by early detection and treatment, Collins asserted.
Edited by
Jamie Epstein
