Development of a customizable website to follow-up physical rehabilitation of cardiovascular patients at home

Abstract

The growing demand for remote patient monitoring solutions, especially in the management of chronic conditions such as cardiovascular diseases, has highlighted the need for flexible and accessible digital tools for home monitoring. This project presents the development of an open source exercise monitoring website to support cardiac rehabilitation programs, specifically tailored for the East Galway Roscommon Integrated Care Hub in Ireland. The platform enables patients to complete a periodic diary of physical activities, including exercise type, duration, and intensity, among others, and allows them to view their progress through graphs. It also allows healthcare professionals to monitor the patients’ exercise data, send feedback messages, and export the data in a conventional spreadsheet format. The website was tested with simulated patients and professionals, with more than 2.000 data and messages transferred without error. Feedback confirmed the platform’s reliability, ease of use and compatibility with all major browsers. A key objective of the project was to make the tool implementable and adaptable by healthcare professionals without the need for web development skills. To achieve this, a comprehensive implementation and customization manual has been developed, allowing healthcare professionals in a variety of clinical settings to adapt the platform to their specific needs. Given that existing telemedicine tools are often generic and inflexible, this project presents a practical and low-cost solution for healthcare professionals to monitor the progress of their patients and offer them personalized support.