Remote Therapeutic Monitoring Use Among Commercially Insured and Medicare Advantage Patients.
Joseph H Joo, Jessica I Billig, Nadia Lieu and 2 others
PMID 42766843WHAT IT FOUND
Remote therapeutic monitoring use was mostly for musculoskeletal problems (56.3% of commercial use), and other clinicians such as therapists and nurses delivered 48.7%.
Use grew from 2089 months in 2022 to 24,494 months in 2024, but most patients used it for only one calendar year.
Key findings
01RTM use increased from 2089 months in 2022 to 24,494 months in 2024, across 16,116 patients.
02Musculoskeletal and connective tissue diseases were the most common RTM diagnosis category, accounting for 56.3% of commercial and 45.0% of Medicare Advantage use.
03Among commercially insured patients, 48.7% of RTM was delivered by other clinicians such as therapists and nurses.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for PTs
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What it does not show
The study was descriptive and could not evaluate whether RTM use affected clinical outcomes. It used claims data and did not include traditional Medicare patients. The category 'other clinicians' groups therapists and nurses together, so it cannot show PT, OT, or SLP-specific RTM use. Only patients with at least 1 RTM month and 11 months of insurance enrollment were included, so brief or non-billed RTM use may be missed.
Declared interests
Funding was from the University of Texas Southwestern National Institutes of Health Clinical and Translational Science Award (grant 1U54TR002361). JML reported service on the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission, the Physician-Focused Payment Model Technical Advisory Committee, and the Health Care Payment Learning and Action Network Patient Empowerment Workgroup, with views not representing those groups. Others reported no conflict.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read this as evidence that RTM improves patient outcomes. It only describes billed RTM use and cannot separate PTs, OTs, or SLPs from other clinicians.