Telemedicine interventions to reduce blood pressure in a chronic disease population: A meta-analysis

Elevated blood pressure (BP) is a leading risk factor for many chronic diseases. Many investigations conducted using telemedicine (TM)-based interventions have the potential to control BP. The purpose of this study was to assess the efficacy of TM-based interventions in reducing BP.

Studies were selected from PubMed, PMC, Web of Science, Embase, Google Scholar, Cochrane Library, the Chinese National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI) and the Chinese Biomedical Literature Database (CBM) according to the inclusion and exclusion criteria. The mean and standard deviation changes in systolic BP (SBP) and diastolic BP (DBP) were analysed using standard mean difference (SMD) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) with a random-effects model or fixed-effects model to assess the efficiency of controlling BP. Subgroup analysis, influence analysis and publication bias analysis were also conducted.

Sixteen randomised clinical trials were included in this meta-analysis. A TM-based lifestyle intervention significantly reduced daytime SBP (SMD = -0.18, 95% CI -0.27 to -0.10; p < 0.001) and DBP (SMD = -0.18, 95% CI -0.27 to -0.09; p < 0.001). The results of subgroup analysis indicated that this reduction in BP was reliable when BP interventions lasted for 6 months or longer in populations with cardiovascular disease and hypertension. Moreover, the detection data should be delivered by a device system to ensure accuracy.

A TM-based intervention could reduce daytime SBP and DBP in populations with hypertension and cardiovascular disease. This review provides intuitive evidence of a reduction in BP using TM-based interventions.