Reference: April 2026 | Issue 4 | Vol 12 | Page 4
Remote monitoring increases symptom control and reduces hospitalisations in children with asthma, according to research presented at the ERS Congress 2025.
The study included 2,528 children with asthma (age six to 18 years) attending six Dutch hospitals between 2017 and 2023. Of these, 1,374 children used remote monitoring at least some of the time and 2,236 children were not using remote monitoring.
Some of the children were included in both groups as they spent some time not using remote monitoring, then switched to remote monitoring during the study. Children were followed for two to three years on average.
The research showed that remote monitoring reduced the risk of an emergency hospital visit by approximately 49 per cent and reduced the risk of hospitalisation by approximately 57 per cent.
The researchers calculated that one hospitalisation could be prevented for every 39 children using remote monitoring. Overall, the proportion of children with well-controlled asthma increased from 77 per cent to 86 per cent after they started using the system.
Presenting the findings, Dr Martinus Oppelaar, Amalia Children’s Hospital, Radboud University Centre, the Netherlands, said: “Our team has previously run a successful clinical trial where we showed that remote asthma monitoring can replace 50 per cent of standard outpatient appointments. However, routine care in the real world is more complex and messier than a highly controlled research setting.
“In the following years, we’ve been able to scale up our remote monitoring platform for large-scale use in routine care. This put us in the unique position to study how the research translates to these complex and messy routine care settings. This is a very important next step in the digital transition of health systems.”
Dr Oppelaar said: “By studying remote monitoring in the real world, we have been able to show that there are clear benefits in terms of preventing the need for hospital care for children with asthma. We see an immediate drop in visits to the emergency room and hospitalisations, and a longer-term reduction in symptoms and children needing in-person outpatient care.
“Remote monitoring is not a new drug; it won’t make [the] disease disappear. It can, however, help children and their families manage their asthma better.
“Managing a chronic disease can be tough, especially for children, remote monitoring can make it a little bit easier. This then leads to better outcomes and lasting self-management skills.
“Crucially, the monitoring system also alerts the hospital if there are signs of children’s symptoms getting worse. This means doctors and nurses can make contact and change children’s treatment when needed.”
Dr Louise Fleming, from the European Respiratory Society’s expert group on paediatric asthma and allergy, and Professor of Paediatric Respiratory Medicine, Imperial College London, who was not involved in the research, said: “We already have good evidence from clinical trials that at-home monitoring can keep children with asthma well.
“This new study builds on that research by looking at how at-home monitoring works for children and their families in normal life. The results show that, with monitoring, we can keep more children well and out of hospital.
“If we can implement more remote services like this one, it will help us to offer the best healthcare services to our patients without increasing costs,” she said.
Reference
Oppelaar M, Boehmer A, Niers L, et al. Assessment of healthcare consumption and asthma control after implementation of remote monitoring in long-term multicentre paediatric asthma care. Abstract OA2346. European Respiratory Society Congress 27 September-1 October 2025. Amsterdam, Netherlands.
