NCT01117675

A New Telemedicine Approach for Chronic HIV/AIDS Patient Home Care

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 83 (actual)
• Sponsor: Hospital Clinic of Barcelona · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

Background: Antiretroviral therapy has changed the natural history of the HIV infection in developed countries becoming a chronic disease. This clinical scenario would need a new approach to control patients, simplifying the follow-up visits and the accessibility to the healthcare professionals. A new home care model using a telemedicine system (Virtual Hospital) was developed.

Detailed description

Stable HIV-infected patients with access to a computer and broadband were randomized to: arm I, patients monitored by Virtual Hospital the first year and arm II patients monitored in the hospital the first year (standard of care). After 1 year of follow up, patients were crossed into the other arm. A "Virtual Hospital" was developed to integrate the control of patient in a multidisciplinary telecare team, allowing the patient to be remotely followed-up by the healthcare professionals through Internet. Virtual Hospital had four main services: Virtual Consultations, Telepharmacy, Virtual Library and Virtual Community. A technical and a clinical evaluation of Virtual Hospital were made.

Conditions

• HIV Infection

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
OTHER	Virtual Hospital	A new home care model using a telemedicine system (Virtual Hospital) to care chronic HIV-infected patients
OTHER	Standard of Care	Standard of Care

Timeline

• Start date: 2005-01-01
• Primary completion: 2007-12-01
• Completion: 2007-12-01
• First posted: 2010-05-05
• Last updated: 2010-05-05

Locations

1 site across 1 country: Spain