A 57-Year-Old Man with Type 1 Diabetes Mellitus and a Chronic Foot Ulcer Successfully Managed with a Remote Patient-Facing Wound Care Smartphone Application
BACKGROUND Wounds affect millions of people world-wide, with care being costly and difficult to deliver remotely. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic highlights the urgent need for telehealth solutions to play a larger role as part of remote care strategies for patient monitoring and care. We describe our...
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| Published in: | The American journal of case reports Vol. 22; p. e933879 |
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| Main Authors: | , , , |
| Format: | Journal Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
United States
International Scientific Literature, Inc
15-12-2021
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | Get full text |
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| Summary: | BACKGROUND Wounds affect millions of people world-wide, with care being costly and difficult to deliver remotely. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic highlights the urgent need for telehealth solutions to play a larger role as part of remote care strategies for patient monitoring and care. We describe our findings on the use of a patient-facing wound care app (Swift Patient Connect App, Swift Medical, Canada) as an innovative solution in remote wound assessment and management of a diabetic patient's wound. CASE REPORT In February 2020, a 57-year-old man with type I diabetes and peripheral arterial disease presented with osteomyelitis in the left foot at the fifth metatarsal, arising from a chronic ulcer. The wound was deep, with purulent discharge and polymicrobial growth. A 6-week course of intravenous antibiotics was administered, with slow improvement of the wound. At a follow-up appointment in June 2020, The Patient Connect app was recommended to the patient to securely share calibrated images of his wound as well to communicate with his doctor. Between June 2020 and January 2021, wound closure was accurately monitored as part of the management of this diabetic foot infection. The app was also used in the management of 2 subsequent wounds and infection episodes. CONCLUSIONS Use of the Swift Patient Connect App designed to monitor and manage wounds by a patient with diabetes and foot ulcer as part of a remote care strategy resulted in numerous benefits expressed by the patient. After initial adoption, 3 successive wounds were managed with a combination of in-person and telehealth visits complemented by the app. Incorporation of this technology as part of a novel telemedicine strategy promises to have an extensive impact on remote care delivery during the current COVID-19 pandemic and beyond. |
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| Bibliography: | ObjectType-Case Study-2 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-4 content type line 23 ObjectType-Report-1 ObjectType-Article-3 Funds Collection Authors’ Contribution Conflict of interest: LYK has no conflicts of interest to declare. JRG holds a Mitacs Elevate Postdoctoral Fellowship in conjunction with McGill University as Academic Partner and Swift Medical as Industrial Partner. RF is an employee at Swift Medical. SCW is a co-founder, shareholder, and Chief Medical Officer of Swift Medical, Inc; she currently receives no compensation from the company. All author’s roles in the project were not on behalf of any of the mentioned company or entities but rather in the context of their academic appointments/affiliations Ling Yuan Kong and Jose Luis Ramirez-GarciaLuna contributed equally to this work Data Interpretation Financial support: None declared Literature Search Data Collection Study Design Manuscript Preparation Statistical Analysis |
| ISSN: | 1941-5923 1941-5923 |
| DOI: | 10.12659/AJCR.933879 |