title: The impact of telehealthcare on the quality and safety of care: a systematic overview.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Telehealthcare involves the use of information and communication technologies to deliver healthcare at a distance and to support patient self-management through remote monitoring and personalised feedback. It is timely to scrutinise the evidence regarding the benefits, risks and costs of telehealthcare.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Two reviewers searched for relevant systematic reviews published from January 1997 to November 2011 in: The Cochrane Library, MEDLINE, EMBASE, LILACS, IndMed and PakMed. Reviewers undertook independent quality assessment of studies using the Critical Appraisal Skills Programme (CASP) tool for systematic reviews. 1,782 review articles were identified, from which 80 systematic reviews were selected for inclusion. These covered a range of telehealthcare models involving both synchronous (live) and asynchronous (store-and-forward) interactions between provider and patients. Many studies showed no differences in outcomes between telehealthcare and usual care. Several reviews highlighted the large number of short-term (<12 months) feasibility studies with under 20 participants. Effects of telehealthcare on health service indicators were reported in several reviews, particularly reduced hospitalisations. The reported clinical effectiveness of telehealthcare interventions for patients with long-term conditions appeared to be greatest in those with more severe disease at high-risk of hospitalisation and death. The failure of many studies to adequately describe the intervention makes it difficult to disentangle the contributions of technological and human/organisational factors on the outcomes reported. Evidence on the cost-effectiveness of telehealthcare remains sparse. Patient safety considerations were absent from the evaluative telehealthcare literature.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Policymakers and planners need to be aware that investment in telehealthcare will not inevitably yield clinical or economic benefits. It is likely that the greatest gains will be achieved for patients at highest risk of serious outcomes. There is a need for longer-term studies in order to determine whether the benefits demonstrated in time limited trials are sustained.
authors: eHealth Research Group, Centre for Population Health Sciences, The University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, United Kingdom.
authors: Susannah
authors: S
authors: McLean
authors: Aziz
authors: A
authors: Sheikh
authors: Kathrin
authors: K
authors: Cresswell
authors: Ulugbek
authors: U
authors: Nurmatov
authors: Mome
authors: M
authors: Mukherjee
authors: Akiko
authors: A
authors: Hemmi
authors: Claudia
authors: C
authors: Pagliari
mesh_terms: D016206:Databases, Bibliographic; D003695:Delivery of Health Care / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006760:Hospitalization / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006801:Humans; D011787:Quality of Health Care / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D017216:Telemedicine / Q000458:organization & administration / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006113:United Kingdom
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