State of Art of Telemonitoring in Patients with Diabetes Mellitus, with a Focus on Elderly Patients

Abstract

Since the beginning of the 1990s, several telemedicine projects and studies focused on type 1 and type 2 diabetes have been developed, including very few elderly diabetic patients. Several of these projects specifically concerned elderly subjects (n = 4). Mainly, these projects and studies show that telemonitoring diabetes results in improved blood glucose control—a significant reduction in HbA1c, improved patient ownership of the disease, greater patient adherence to therapeutic and hygiene-dietary measures, positive impact on comorbidities (hypertension, weight, dyslipidemia), improved quality of life for patients, and at least good patient recep-tivity and accountability. To date, the magnitude of its effects remains debatable, especially with the variation in patients’ characteristics (e.g., background, ability for self-management, medical condition), sample selection, and approach for treatment of control groups. Over the last 5 years, numerous telemedicine projects based on connected objects and new information and communication technologies (ICT) (ele-ments defining telemedicine 2.0) have emerged or are still under development.