Remote monitoring at Hendrick Health helps heart failure patients with quality of life

A technologically advanced device approximately the size of a jumbo paperclip is helping heart failure patients at Hendrick Health reduce their hospitalizations and enjoy a better quality of life.

The CardioMEMS HF System from Abbott is remote monitoring technology that tracks blood pressures in a patient’s pulmonary artery in the lung and wirelessly transmits the data to the patient’s healthcare providers at Hendrick Health’s Heart Failure Clinic. Based on the data, the providers can notify the patient if there’s a pressure change that requires an adjustment in treatment or medication.

This small device is inserted and threaded through a vein and implanted in the pulmonary artery during a procedure in Hendrick Catheterization Lab.

“It’s kind of like an Apple watch that records your heart rate,” said Dr. Mark Lawrence, an interventional cardiologist with Hendrick Clinic Cardiology. “It does it in the background. So, the patients really don’t know it’s happening.”

Patients with the CardioMEMS device can go about their daily routine. Once a day, they lie briefly on a special pillow fitted with a sensor that transmits the pressure readings. The pulmonary artery pressure changes can be detected by the CardioMEMS system before the patient feels symptomatic.

“So, we can intervene prior to symptoms occurring, which is another advantage,” said Dr. Lawrence.

Intervening sooner helps reduce shortness of breath and other symptoms of heart failure that can lead to hospitalization.

“Overall, patients with this device feel better because they have more control over their heart failure,” said Dr. Lawrence.