Randomized Controlled Clinical Trial of “Virtual House Calls” for Parkinson Disease

National randomized controlled trial of virtual house calls for Parkinson disease

“…DISCUSSION As demonstrated in this national study, providing remote neurologic care to individuals with PD directly into their homes is feasible. The proportion of visits completed (over 90%) is in line with the proportion of in-person clinic visits completed in an earlier pilot study 16 and on par with, if not better than, many published studies of no-show rates for traditional in-person clinic appointments. 25 The absence of improvement in quality of life from the addition of virtual visits in this study could be due to several factors, including the possibility that virtual visits with a specialist are insufficient to improve quality of life.…”

“…11,12,14 Pilot efforts have suggested that virtual house calls are feasible, valuable to patients, and have similar clinical outcomes to inperson care in PD. [15][16][17][18][19] We therefore conducted a national randomized controlled study of virtual house calls to determine whether this model of specialty care delivery is feasible, valuable, and beneficial.…”

National Randomized Controlled Trial of Virtual House Calls for People with Parkinson's Disease: Interest and Barriers

“…16 Parkinson's disease also burdens caregivers, 17 frequently requires institutional care, [18][19][20] generates high healthcare costs, 21,22 and benefits from specialty care. [23][24][25][26] However, over 40% of Medicare beneficiaries with Parkinson's disease do not receive care from a neurologist within the first 4 years after diagnosis, 26 and those who do not have worse health outcomes, including a 22% increased risk of death within 6 years. 26 Because many motor features (e.g., tremor, bradykinesia, gait changes) are assessed visually 27 and many nonmotor aspects (e.g., depression) are assessed by history, Parkinson's disease is well suited to remote assessment.…”

“…29 A 6-month randomized pilot study of 20 individuals demonstrated that video visits into the home were feasible, could produce comparable outcomes to traditional in-person care, and saved patients and their caregivers 3 hours of time and 100 miles of travel per visit. 24 However, national, large-scale studies of virtual house calls are lacking for Parkinson's disease and other chronic conditions. To that end, we are conducting such a multicenter study and here report baseline data, as well as interest, feasibility, and barriers to enrollment.…”

Managing Migraine via Telemedicine: Clinical Effectiveness and Process Implications

“…It has already been used for pediatrics, psychiatry, movement disorders, neurological disorders like Alzheimer's disease and epilepsy, dermatological disorders, and such chronic disorders as diabetes; see [8], [5], for various applications, and [15] for reviews of telemedicine's cost-effectiveness.…”