Telestroke lowers costs, improves outcomes

Telestroke—or utilizing telemedicine to deliver stroke care—is an effective means to delivering quality emergency stroke care to remote hospitals and improving patient outcomes, according to a Mayo Clinic study appearing in the American Journal of Managed Care. Telestroke also appears cost-effective for society, the research found.

In telestroke care, a telestroke robot allows a patient with stroke to be examined in real time by a remote neurology specialist who consults via computer with an emergency room physician at another site, usually a rural hospital, which may not have neurology specialists. Mayo Clinic provides telestroke care by acting as a single source of specialized care to connect a network of multiple hospitals spokes.

Compared with no network, a telestroke system consisting of a single hub and seven spoke hospitals resulted in the appropriate use of more clot-busting drugs, more catheter-based interventional procedures and other stroke therapies, with more stroke patients discharged home independently, according to the study. The entire network of hospitals engaged in the network realized a greater total cost savings. A patient treated in the context of a telestroke network incurred $1,436 lower costs and gained 0.02 quality-adjusted life-years over a lifetime.

“The results serve to inform government organizations, insurers, healthcare institutions, practitioners, patients, and the general public that an upfront investment in telemedicine and stroke network personnel can be justified in our health system,” said neurologist Bart Demaerschalk, MD, director of the Mayo Clinic Telestroke Program, and the study's lead author.

Researchers from the Georgia Health Sciences University and Analysis Group also participated in this study.