Abstract:
Abstract Objective: Proprietary intermediate telehealth devices are those which
are specifically designed as connectors between the entities of telehealth
systems. This article seeks to understand what are the capabilities of such
devices and then to investigate how these are clustered on the current
generation of devices. Materials and Methods: Fourteen current-generation
devices available from 12 device providers were selected and analyzed. Four
categories of questions were composed to evaluate the devices: setup/
configuration, available features, inputs, and outputs. Results: Data were
collected and synthesized on the following capabilities: availability from
suppliers, setup, environments of use, multiple-condition monitoring, multiuser
capabilities, prompts, reminders and alerts, interaction with the health
professional, access to historical data, device inputs, and their transfer
technology. Conclusions: There are three main roles for proprietary intermediate
devices in telehealth systems: displaying information to the patient; receiving
data manually/automatically; forwarding results and questionnaire responses to
another entity. Provider Perspective: Intermediate devices are usually part of
closed proprietary systems. Providers produce disease-customisable devices.
Connectivity is considerably ahead of the current generation of point-of-care
devices. However, little data are available on connection to rest of the
proprietary system. Patient Perspective: It shows clear benefit that one
intermediate device can be potentially used with several chronic conditions.
Simple setup, authentication procedures, and automatic data transfer are key
design aspects. Health Professional Perspective: Little direct interaction with
the health professional was observed. Payer Perspective: Details of costs of
devices are generally unavailable; system providers indicate that cost
variability is based on "user requirements."