January 25, 2001 VA Telehealth Care Rural Care Coordination
DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS INCREASES DEPLOYMENT OF HEALTH HERO SERVICE TO PATIENTS ACROSS MULTIPLE STATES
Internet Enabled Rural Care Coordination Program Expands Number of Patients and Diseases Served
Mountain View, CA - January 25, 2001 - Health Hero Network, Inc., the leading Internet-based platform for remote patient management, today announced that VISN 8, the Integrated Delivery Network (IDN) for the Department of Veterans Affairs, has moved forward with plans to expand the number of chronically ill veterans supported by the Health Hero® iCare Desktop™ and Health Buddy® appliance. Citing favorable patient satisfaction and outcome analysis, the recently launched VISN Care Coordination program will grow to support larger numbers of patients in the Florida and South Georgia region, as well as additional disease states covered.
The Health Hero patient management solution is currently used by VISN 8 as part of its home technology demonstration initiative aimed at increasing the quality of health care services for veterans. This initiative is meant to improve clinical outcomes, reduce costs, and increase patient satisfaction by identifying potential problems sooner, thereby keeping patients as healthy as possible. The Health Hero enhanced program will support patients with Congestive Heart Failure (CHF), Hypertension, Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), Diabetes, and Mental Illness including Bi-Polar Disorder and Depression.
“The Health Buddy has been an asset to our Care Coordinators in proactively resolving potential health problems,” said Rita Kobb, ARNP, Care Coordinator of the Rural Home Care Project based in Lake City, FL. “Patients have responded very positively to the technology.”
The Health Hero platform consists of the Health Hero iCare Desktop™, a web-based patient management tool, and the Health Buddy Personal Information Appliance - an easy-to-use appliance placed in the patient’s home or other point of care. Together the web tools and appliance form an integrated solution that helps care managers identify potential problems with patients before they occur while facilitating education for self-management and behavior modification.
“The Department of Veterans Affairs has shown its dedication to finding better ways to care for Veterans before they end up in the hospital and after they go home,” said Steve Brown, CEO of Health Hero Network. “We are honored to be a technology partner supporting these innovations in care management by our nation’s largest healthcare delivery system.”
Health Hero provides its platform and Health Buddy® appliance, to managed care organizations, HMOs, Hospitals/IDNs, Provider Networks and Disease Management companies seeking an efficient and effective solution to remotely monitor and manage patients with a variety of chronic conditions. In a meta-analysis of data from three customer sites deploying Health Hero’s platform for Congestive Heart Failure (CHF), the Health Hero solution has been shown to reduce utilization of hospital and ER services by 69% and to reduce costs by more than $8000 per patient per year (PPPY).
About Health Hero Network
Health Hero Network, Inc., based in Mountain View, California, develops and markets the industry leading technology platform for remote patient communications, monitoring, and care management. The Health Hero platform includes a technology platform for remote patient monitoring and Internet-based care management and research application services. The Health Hero® solution consists of web-based tools for caregivers and the Health Buddy® appliance, iCare Desktop™, a web based patient management application for health care professionals, patient interfaces such as the Health Buddy appliance, a secure data center acting as the repository for application services and collected data, and content for over a dozen major chronic diseases. Health Hero Network licenses its platform to medical technology and services companies seeking a technology blueprint proven to enable better chronic care with lower costs to the healthcare system. Health Hero Network technology is protected by over 40 issued U.S. patents. For more information about Health Hero, visit www.healthhero.com.
