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SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. – Spire Health, a leader in virtual care for chronic respiratory disease patients, has published the results of a study showing that use of their virtual care service is associated with a reduction in emergency visits and hospital admissions. The study enrolled patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), the third leading cause of death worldwide. Acute exacerbations of COPD are associated with significant rates of hospitalization and accelerated disease progression.
Conducted at a multi-provider pulmonary practice, the study included 126 COPD patients who had at least one unplanned hospitalization or emergency room visit in the year prior to enrollment. Only participants enrolled in Spire for at least 12 months were enrolled. The study was approved by the Western Institutional Review Board and registered on ClinicalTrials.gov (#NCT05518981).
Published in the International Journal of COPD, this is likely the first study to investigate the clinical impact that virtual care enabled through continuous cardiorespiratory monitoring can have on healthcare resource utilization in COPD. Use of the Spire system was associated with a significant decrease in all-cause hospitalizations per patient per year (1.09 ± 0.07 to 0.38 ± 0.06, P<0.001). The number of cardiopulmonary-specific admissions also decreased 64% (0.70 ± 0.08 to 0.25 ± 0.05, P<0.001). The number of outpatient pulmonary visits increased 13% (4.22 ± 0.24 to 4.78 ± 0.28, P<0.05), suggesting Spire virtual care was redirecting care from acute to less expensive settings.
Due to the proprietary and easy to use Spire Health Tag, which minimizes patient burden by requiring no recharging and adhering directly to clothing, mean device adherence in the cohort was 88.6% ± 1.1% of days with at least 8 hours of wear time.
"These results are incredibly promising and support the potential of Spire’s system to help improve the long-term management of COPD," said Dr. Michael Polsky, a pulmonologist at Pulmonary Associates of Richmond. "Reducing acute healthcare utilization not only benefits patients but also leads to significant cost savings for healthcare providers and payers."
“Results such as these are the reason I recently joined Spire as its new CEO,” said Michael J. Doyle, CEO of Spire Health. “Our clients want to live in the comfort of their homes and avoid frequent trips to the emergency room or hospital. For COPD patients, Spire can help make this possible. Because at Spire, every breath counts.”
About Spire Health
Spire Health is the leading provider of virtual care for chronic respiratory disease patients in the nation. Spire’s unique FDA cleared continuous virtual care system achieves extremely high levels of patient compliance which allows Spire’s clinical teams greater opportunity to detect deterioration in the patient’s condition and the ability to intervene in the patient’s care before an admission to the hospital or trip to the emergency room. Spire is committed to providing better outcomes and quality of life for chronic respiratory patients while reducing utilization and total cost of care. Spire Health partners with leading integrated health systems, physician practices and managed care organizations across the country to help them effectively manage their cardiorespiratory patients.
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