March 14, 2000
Tele-HomeCare Project
What is the Tele-HomeCare Project (THC)?
The Tele-HomeCare Project is a research study looking at a new way of caring for children at home.
The Tele-HomeCare Project services are delivered jointly by The Hospital for Sick
Children (SickKids) and the Community Care Access Centres (CCAC). The CCAC will provide the community health, personal support and case management
services to the patients as well as a link to SickKids.
Does this mean that the patient will leave the hospital sooner?
Not necessarily. The doctors and other members of the child’s medical team will decide when the patient is ready to go home.
How will children be chosen for the project?
Children who may be candidates will be identified by their clinical team from the following services: Cardiology and Cardiovascular Surgery, Respiratory Medicine, General Paediatrics, Otolaryngology (ears nose and throat) and the Critical Care Unit.
Children will be carefully chosen based on the type of care they require and how often they need to be checked. Children who need to be checked more than every 4 hours will not be chosen. Doctors and other members of the child’s medical team will decide what type of care best suits each child’s needs. Those chosen will be on Tele-HomeCare for up to 6 weeks.
How does Tele-HomeCare work?
A video camera lets the family, the patient, and specially trained nurses at the SickKids Bell Home Tele-Monitoring Centre see, hear and talk with each other. A special monitor lets doctors and nurses check the child’s vital signs, such as heart rate, blood pressure and breathing. This information is sent to the centre through a phone line.
The nurses at the centre, the patient’s doctors, other members of the patient’s medical team, and the nurses who visit the patient home, will all work together to care for the child.
What will parents have to do?
Before the child leaves the hospital, a nurse will teach the child’s parents how to use the monitor and phone equipment. Someone from the hospital will visit the patient’s home to set the equipment up.
When the patient and family arrive home, a nurse at the SickKids Bell Home Tele-Monitoring Centre will call to check in on the patient. It will be the parents job to hook the child up to the monitor and to tell the nurse how the child is doing.
Parents can call a nurse at the centre at any time - day or night.
What will be studied in the pilot project?
The project will help to evaluate the impact of the technology on the patient and family, their quality of life and the quality of care. In addition, it will assess the impact on health care providers in the hospital and the community and cost effectiveness. If there are differences between children and families who receive Tele-HomeCare and those who solely receive visits from nurses in the community.
How may Tele-HomeCare help patients and their families?
Some of the things we want to find out are:
- How does being at home with Tele-HomeCare impact on family life?
- How does Tele-HomeCare affect the wellness of the child?
- Do patients and families like Tele-HomeCare?
The answers to these questions will help the team decide if Tele-HomeCare should be used with other patients and families.
How long will the pilot project last?
The research phase of the project will begin this spring and will determine the effectiveness of the service on a small, specialized patient population identified as having continuing monitoring needs post-discharge. Up to 10 children at a time will receive Tele-HomeCare and, by the time the pilot wraps up in the Fall, over 60 children will have received this service.
Who answers the phone lines in the SickKids Bell Home Tele-Monitoring Centre?
The phone will be answered directly by specially trained nurses from The Hospital for Sick children working in the centre.
If something unforeseen happens, what safety measures are in place?
Tele-HomeCare is not for children requiring constant watch because of worries their condition will suddenly worsen. However, if children at home do experience an unexpected worsening, parents will be instructed to call 911 (as they would without Tele-HomeCare). Parents will also receive explicit instructions and direction on what to do in the event their is a phone service interruption or problems with the equipment in the home. These instructions will suggest alternative ways of making contact with the centre, which will change depending on the situation.
Who’s funding THC pilot project?
The Tele-HomeCare Project is a close collaboration of public and private organizations. The THC Project received a research grant from the federal Health Infostructure Support Program to design the service, implement and evaluate it. The SickKids Bell Home Tele-Monitoring Centre was established through a substantial donation from Bell.
Others who have participated and made donations in kind to the project include:
- Toronto Community Care Access Centre who assisted in the service development and who will provide the community health and personal support services;
- TecKnowledge Healthcare Systems Inc., who provided technical and development expertise in helping to design the service;
- Home Care Evaluation and Research Centre at the University of Toronto who is assisting in the evaluation of the project.
- Geoffrey H Wood Foundation and The Hospital for Sick Children Foundation for the support the Telehealth Evaluation Program has received in developing the expertise and support for carrying out this research.
For more information contact:
Helen Simeon
Public Affairs
The Hospital for Sick Children
(416) 813-6380
e-mail:
website: www.sickkids.on.ca.
Public Affairs
The Hospital for Sick Children
555 University Avenue
Suite 1742, Public Affairs, First floor Atrium
Toronto,
ON
M5G 1X8
Canada
Phone: 416-813-5058
Fax: 416-813-5328