Novel noninvasive hemodynamics and telemedicine improve outcome and reduce health care cost

After several decades of meagre rises in patient outcomes, cardiovascular health care is now on the verge of far-reaching, diagnostic, therapeutic, patient management and outcome improvement changes. The reasons can be summarized as follows: 1) a direct correlation between adequate oxygen delivery and (a) quality of life in general population, and (b) better outcomes in surgical and critically ill patients, has been established in numerous clinical studies; 2) real-time communication of computer acquired and processed medical data via the Internet or intranets is becoming routine; 3) a clinically accurate, real-time, continuous and noninvasive measurement of global blood flow is now available. This contribution brings in a quantitative and qualitative change in the scope of cardiovascular assessment.