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HUS-led project produces one-of-a-kind home dialysis tool
Helsinki University Hospital (HUS) says the digital system is the world’s first that uses the same interface for patients and medical professionals.
HUSA home dialysis solution for patients with kidney failure has emerged from a project launched under CleverHealth Network, an ecosystem coordinated by Helsinki University Hospital (HUS).
The project brought all dialysis-related processes, laboratory results, welfare information, care supply orders and communication into a simple real-time interface that serves both the patient and the care team throughout the treatment. The care information is transferred to the interface either automatically or through patient-filled electronic forms, making paper forms a thing of the past.
“We clarified the previous complicated process of ordering supplies,” told Virpi Rauta, the nephrologist who led the project at HUS. “We also added regular patient surveys on symptoms and the quality of life to our new model.”
Carrying out haemodialysis at home rather than in hospital can yield annual cost savings of 20–40 000 euros, according to HUS.
The digital system is the first in the world that can be integrated into medical record systems and that uses a single interface for both patients and care professionals, the university hospital highlighted. The system is unique also in that it can be adapted to other chronic diseases and, in the future, possibly used to guide smaller healthcare units in the home care of such diseases.
It also has the potential to serve as a platform for the centralised guidance of care and remote monitoring in Finland.
The system is being commercialised with Fujitsu, a partner of CleverHealth Network. Joonas Siitonen, head of healthy living at Fujitsu, pointed out that the system makes use of the remote care ecosystem and partner network of the company to enable a “significant increase” in the treatment of chronic diseases at home.
“Our shared aim is to alleviate the acute cost pressures and shortage of resources in healthcare,” he outlined.