Webinar on telemedicine and hypertension management

Dr Ching during the webinar

A webinar titled “Telemedicine/ mHealth in Hypertension” was conducted via Microsoft Teams on 10 May 2021. Invited to deliver the webinar was UTAR International Collaborative Partner Assoc Prof Dr Ching Siew Mooi from Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences. 

In her talk, Dr Ching first explained that hypertension is a common public health problem worldwide especially in Malaysia, yet the awareness was poor. She stated that telemedicine has thrived and emerged worldwide as an important resource, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic, to improve the management of chronic diseases such as hypertension. She further explained telemedicine, saying that it is a medical service provided remotely or without physical contact via electronic information and communication technology which allows clinicians to care, educate, intervene and monitor the blood pressure of their long-distance patients. 

Dr Ching explaining the differences between telemedicine, telehealth and e-health

Dr Ching presenting how telemedicine works

In order to provide a better understanding, Dr Ching clarified the subtle differences between telemedicine, telehealth and e-health. She explained that the reasons telemedicine or telehealth seems to resonate with people were because they want to cope with the Covid-19 pandemic situation, to enhance the management of hypertension and control of hypertension, as well as to perform remote monitoring and to conduct research in hypertension. She further explained the process of telemedicine and discussed the advantages of telemedicine in hypertension management. She also shared the limitations of telemedicine virtual consultation and talked about how Malaysia Medical Council Advisory regulates and provides guidelines on telemedicine consultation during the Covid-19 pandemic. She also shared the telemonitoring approaches in different countries. 

Dr Ching discussing the advantages and limitations of telemedicine

Furthermore, she presented a research paper stating that home blood pressure telemonitoring can significantly improve clinic systolic and diastolic blood pressure control. She further explained the other advantages of home blood pressure telemonitoring. She also addressed several studies which provided evidence on the clinical usefulness of telemonitoring and mHealth. A Q&A session followed after the webinar where the participants were given an opportunity to raise their questions and feedback.