29 November 2023
A pilot of a portable ECG device that helped protect mental health patients during the COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in it being used across the country.
Our Trust used the KardiaMobile® 6L ECG device on community patients using certain antipsychotic medications as part of a three-month pilot in 2020.
The small, portable device is placed on a patient’s knee and sends the ECG reading direct to a smartphone.
Using it throughout the pandemic ensured that essential ECGs could continue when the population was required to be socially distant.
It also helped mental health professionals track the impact of antipsychotic drugs on a patient’s cardiac health, due to the possible risk of arrhythmias, which can cause convulsions, dizziness and fainting, and in rare cases, sudden death.
Our pilot has now played a key role in changing national guidance around ECGs.
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) published their Early Value Assessment Guidance conditionally recommending the portable ECG for use in psychiatric services. This means it can now be used as an option to measure cardiac QT interval in adults having, or about to have, antipsychotic medication.
Traditionally, ECGs take place in a clinical setting using a large 12-lead ECG. A patient would need to partially undress, have their skin prepared and have ten separate leads attached to their chest, legs and arms.
Dr M Santhana Krishnan, consultant in old age psychiatry/liaison psychiatry at TEWV, who led the pilot project, demonstrated that compared to 12-lead ECGs, the portable device would save hundreds of hours of staff time a year, giving them more time to care for patients.
The NICE recommendation comes with the condition that further evidence must be generated to inform a further full technology reassessment.
Dr M Santhana Krishnnan, said: “We believe this is the first project in the world to enable mental health patients to have an ECG without being attached to a machine with leads, and have it evaluated by NICE.
“To receive an initial recommendation that the portable ECG machine can be used in psychiatric services is very encouraging.
“It’s very important that people taking antipsychotic medicines have a regular ECG, and being able to monitor a person’s health in their own home is much more comfortable and less intrusive.”
