Telemedicine Expands Reach of Care Services for Parkinson's Patients

A unique telemedicine project is providing distant nursing home patients with Parkinson's disease access to neurologists, improving their quality of life and motor function.

Researchers at the University of Rochester Medical Center (URMC, NY, USA), in a joint initiative with the Presbyterian Home for Central New York (New Hartford, USA), a 250 bed nursing home about 150 miles from Rochester, developed the new telemedicine system, which was built on a technological backbone that already existed at URMC. The system--originally used to conduct remote pediatric and dental evaluations on patients in schools, day care centers, and other locations--is essentially a low tech, low cost solution that consists of a laptop, software, and a web camera that allows the physicians to interact with and visually assess patients. The patients are brought to a room in the nursing home with a television so they can see the physicians; all the doctors in URMC require on their end is a computer equipped with a web camera. Using telemedicine thus allows the patient to visit the doctor, just like regular office visits, who can update on the patient's health, review medications, discern potential complications, and perform standardized motor skills evaluation (balance, gait, coordination, and stiffness) with the assistance of a trained nurse at the Presbyterian Home. At the end of the visit, recommendations are discussed with the patient and faxed to the nursing home.

The initial pilot project, funded by the Presbyterian Home, followed 14 patients for 6 months and evaluated the outcomes of those who received telemedicine care with those who did not. The study found that the telemedicine patients had significant improvements in quality of life and motor function; in addition, those receiving telemedicine had trends toward higher satisfaction with their care. The results of the study were presented at the International Congress of Parkinson's Disease and Movement Disorders, held during June 2009 in Paris (France).

"This study shows that we can effectively deliver care for Parkinson's patients via telemedicine,” said study presenter URMC neurologist Ray Dorsey, M.D. "This system enables us to reach and provide a high level of care to patients who might otherwise not have access to a specialist.”

"The number of people with Parkinson's will double over the next 25 years,” said study coauthor Kevin Biglan, M.D. "This should be a wake up call to the medical community and government to invest in innovative ways to bring care to this population. Telemedicine represents a tremendous opportunity to expand access to specialized care and improve the quality of life of patients regardless of where they live.”

Related Links:
University of Rochester Medical Center
Presbyterian Home for Central New York