Health Care : Current Reviews

Telemedicine for chronic childhood diseases: The case for virtual transition to adult care

Global Summit on Telemedicine & eHealth

August 17-18, 2015 Houston, USA

Ami B Bhatt

Massachusetts General Hospital Heart Center, USA

Posters-Accepted Abstracts: Health Care: Current Reviews

Abstract:

Advances in cardiac care have led to increasing rates of survival of children with congenital heart disease. However, as these children age, our healthcare system does not have clear mechanisms in place to ensure successful transition and transfer to adult care. The American Heart Association requires a transition program to provide uninterrupted health care that is patient centered, age and developmentally appropriate, flexible and comprehensive. This includes education about medical conditions and promoting skills in communication, decision making, self-care and self-advocacy. However mechanisms to create a successful longitudinal transfer are not yet established. We initiated the MGH TeleTransition Program in order to improve rates of pediatric to adult transfer of care. The program is based in 3 tennets: Education, engagement and empowerment. This includes the patient, family, pediatric and adult caregivers. We incorporated quality of life, teen lifelong knowledge and markers of adulthood assessment into our program in order to better assess effects and outcomes. We will present to the audience mechanisms to begin telemedicine programs, gain institutional support and measure relevant and accurate outcomes in adolescent ages and with virtual care. This session will hopefully encourage individuals in other disciplines to similarly disrupt the traditional models of transitional care in order to better engage patients especially adolescents and young adults in promoting and participating in their own care.

Biography :

Ami B Bhatt is the Director of the Adult Congenital Heart Disease Center at Massachusetts General Hospital and an active Clinical Cardiologist, Clinical Investigator and Educator. She innovates in the cardiology space at the MGH Heart Center in the domains of telemedicine for patient visits, adolescent education regarding heart health, high risk behaviors and navigating the medical system, multimodality teleconferences and adoption of mobile health technologies with the aid of fellows in training and a patient and family advisory council. She also practices in conjunction with the Healthcare Transformation Lab and runs the Mass General ACHD Health and Wellness program in Waltham. She was the recipient of the W. Proctor Harvey Award by the American College of Cardiology in 2015 and is an internationally recognized for promoting innovation in ACHD care. She has graduated from Harvard University and obtained her Doctoral degree from Yale School of Medicine and then trained at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Children’s Hospital of Boston and Massachusetts General Hospital in Internal Medicine, Pediatrics, Cardiology and Adult Congenital Heart Disease (ACHD). She has developed a robust multidisciplinary curriculum at Mass General to provide requisite ACHD education to cardiovascular fellows throughout Massachusetts.

Email: ABHATT@mgh.harvard.edu