Seasonal Variation In An At-Home Telemonitoring Trial

This paper aims to present findings on seasonal variation in a recently completed Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) national trial of home telemonitoring of patients with chronic conditions, carried out at five locations along the east coast of Australia. Patients in this trial were selected from a list of eligible patients living with a range of chronic conditions. Each test patient was case matched with at least one control patient. A total of 114 test patients and 173 control patients were available in this trial. However, of the 287 patients, we only considered subjects who had one or more admissions in the years 2010-2012. Three different groups were analyzed because of substantially different climates, i.e., Queensland (QLD), Australian Capital Territory & Victoria (ACT + VIC), and Tasmania (TAS). Time series data were analyzed using linear regression for a period of 3 years before the intervention in order to obtain an average seasonal variation pattern.