On Monday Roche went live with a TV advertisement across the North East to raise awareness of warfarin home monitoring. The advert which is being broadcast on prime time television hopes to raise awareness of self-testing among the 80,000 warfarin patients in the region.
For those living in the Durham or Darlington region, a digital home monitoring service is available to patients on the anticoagulant, which connects them directly to their GP or nurse.
The warfarin home monitoring service transforms how patients on long-term anticoagulation medication warfarin are monitored, empowering them to self-test and receive their adjusted warfarin dose. Previously patients on warfarin in the area needed to attend the clinic every few weeks for a simple blood test, to measure how quickly their blood clots using the international normalised ratio (INR).
The home monitoring service for warfarin patients reminds the user to take a finger prick blood sample and insert it into a Roche self-testing device (CoaguChek®) that measures their INR. The patient sends their new INR reading securely to the local clinic at their chosen time and via their communication of choice; examples include a pre-arranged phone call or by going online. The patient’s new warfarin dose, calculated by 4S Dawn’s anticoagulation software, and next test date is then relayed back to them, again by their communication channel of choice. Uniquely Inhealthcare’s technology integrates the data directly into patient records. Patients still feel fully supported as clinicians are available on a supplied helpline and are notified to make contact if a patient is unresponsive to test requests.