The FCC https://www.fcc.gov recently announced that an initial set of pilot projects have been selected for the Connected Care Pilot Program. In January 2021, the FCC announced the first set of awardees for the $100 million Connected Care Pilot Program.
In this round, the FCC selected 14 applicants and awarded $26.5 million. Projects in the initial selections representing several different geographic areas and provider types, will involve patients in underserved communities with a range of health conditions. Additional awardees will be announced in the near future.
The University of Virginia Health System https://www.uvahealth.com in Charlottesville, received a $4.4 million grant that UVA Health will use to expand their Interactive Home Monitoring Care for patients with serious and chronic conditions, including COVID-19 and diabetes.
“Through this federal grant, our remote monitoring and home telehealth programs will be able to serve a larger number of patients from underserved groups and patients from rural communities with acute and chronic illnesses,” said, Karen S. Rheuban, MD, Director of the UVA Center for Telehealth https://www.uvahealth.com/services/telemedicine.
The Interactive Home Monitoring program connects patients and families with resources to support their specific needs, supports pregnant mothers at high risk for delivering early. Support is also provided for transplant patients, premature infants, patients with serious chronic conditions such as heart failure and COPD, and young children born with serious heart conditions. In addition, the program serves patients recovering from COVID 19 and patients with ongoing health conditions such as high blood pressure and diabetes.
The program has improved patient outcomes, including lowering the rate of ED visits and hospital readmissions as well as lowering blood sugar levels for patients with diabetes. With the grant funding, the UVA team hopes to expand the ability to offer home monitoring and telehealth programs by providing data plan-enabled tablet computers to 1,500 underserved patients in 2021 and expand the number of patients that the program will serve over the next two years.