Telehealth

Home Monitoring System
Banner Home Care offers Telehealth monitoring to certain patients who are on Banner Home Care services who have chronic diseases such as Congestive Heart Failure and Diabetes.

The Telehealth monitoring program is provided as an adjunct to the skilled nursing services that are being provided. 

Banner’s Telehealth hospital re-admissions 30 days after discharge for heart patients is 7 percent lower than the national average at 20 percent.  Home Telehealth system:

• BP monitor device
• Digital scale
• Oxygen sensor and monitor

Home Training and Procedure

1. The patients and caregivers are taught to take their vital signs every day.
2. The monitor, which is also a computer, captures the data and sends the information to an internet site where Banner Home Care can monitor the patient’s information on a daily basis including weekends.
3. The patient is asked a short series of questions that is also sent to the internet site. (The questions are geared to identify signs and symptoms that a patient may be having that would indicate a worsening of their condition.)
4. The patients are provided with written material regarding their chronic diseases and medications.
5. The patient is taught  about their medications and how to manage their diseases at home. 

Telehealth Assessment
A Banner Home Care RN monitors and assesses the data and contacts the patient. Based on the findings of this nursing telephone assessment, further interventions may be taken such as contacting the physician, doing a home visit, or directing the patient to the emergency room if their symptoms are severe.  

Referral to Banner Home Care Telehealth monitoring system

1. Physician order for skilled home health needs
2. Call Banner Home Care (480) 497-5535
3. During start of care the home care nurse will also evaluate for telehealth monitoring
4. The physician will be contacted  to write an other order for telehealth services

Follow up:
Once the RN has completed the amount of nursing visits that the physician has ordered, the patient will continue on the telehealth monitoring system. A Banner Home Care RN contacts the patients no less than once per week to go over their data as well as follow up and reinforce the education that has been provided by the Home Care RN.  Some patients, based on their symptoms, need to be contacted more frequently than weekly. The amount of phone interactions that are made between the RN and the patient varies based on each individual situation.