Telemedicine for post-myocardial infarction patients: an observational study

"SHL" Telemedicine (established 1987 in Israel) provides professional care to subscribers who use cardiobeepers and contact its medical call center via telecommunication networks. The extended 6-month Acute Coronary Syndrome Israel Survey (ACSIS) 2004 involved all 26 intensive cardiac care units in Israeli hospitals. We compared the 1-year survival rates of the "SHL" Telemedicine subscribers and ACSIS participants who survived hospitalization after sustaining an acute myocardial infarction. The myocardial infarction data for the ACSIS cohort (3,899 patients) and the SHL Telemedicine cohort (699 subscribers) were provided for this study by the ACSIS executive and SHL's files, respectively. One-year mortality was ascertained by telephone contacts with patients or their relatives. Mortality at 1 year was 4.4% for the "SHL" patients and 9.7% for the ACSIS patients (p < 0.0001). The "SHL" cohort was significantly older (p < 0.0001) than the ACSIS cohort (mean age [+/-SD] 69 +/- 11 versus 63 +/- 13 years), had significantly more past myocardial infarctions (p < 0.001), more past strokes (p < 0.0032), more heart failure (p < 0.0001), more hypertension (p = 0.002), and more hyperlipidemia (p < 0.0001). Gender distribution and diabetes status were similar for both groups. In spite of having more risk factors than the ACSIS subjects, the "SHL" Telemedicine subscribers had significantly higher survival rates at 1 year compared to the ACSIS patients, whose outcome is consistent with that of the Western world. Availability of medical call centers in the out-of-hospital setting for patients with suspected cardiac symptoms improves their motivation to seek timely and appropriate medical assistance.