Decoding the Petersen Report: A Roadmap for RTM Adoption and Success

The Peterson Health Technology Institute (PHTI) has released a comprehensive 2025 report titled Evolving Remote Monitoring: An Evidence-Based Approach to Coverage and Payment, and the results are clear: remote therapeutic monitoring (RTM) is effective, and its use is growing rapidly.

The Petersen report evaluated remote monitoring solutions for the management of type 2 diabetes, musculoskeletal conditions, and hypertension. PHTI’s evaluations found “remote monitoring technologies can improve outcomes and reduce spending—but also that clinical effectiveness and duration of benefit vary significantly by condition.”

Let’s take a look at the report’s findings and examine our key takeaways on the clinical efficacy and economic impact of remote therapeutic monitoring in managing chronic conditions such as musculoskeletal disorders.

How Are Providers Using Remote Therapeutic Monitoring Today?

One of the most impactful findings of this report was RTM’s ability to improve chronic disease management, particularly for musculoskeletal (MSK) conditions. 

• The report found that “59 percent of all RTM episodes in traditional Medicare were used to treat musculoskeletal conditions.” Additionally, most musculoskeletal conditions are treated as episodes that benefit from targeted physical therapy over two to four months.¹

• On average, patients complete eight in-person physical therapy sessions, and physical therapists track improvements using validated measures of pain and function until symptoms reduce.² 

• However, RTM usage is very low: “less than 0.2 percent of traditional Medicare beneficiaries in 2023 received RTM services (approximately 52,500). The length of use was also short, with an average duration of 2.1 months (with 74 percent of RTM usage ending within the first three months).”

• The report found that “the average duration of RTM episodes is more aligned with the clinical evidence, which supports shorter episodes of two to four months for people with musculoskeletal conditions during targeted physical therapy.”

• From 2022 to 2023, “spending for RTM in Traditional Medicare rose from $2.2 to $10.4 million. Interestingly, about 46 percent of Traditional Medicare beneficiaries who received RTM services had them delivered by a provider assistant.”

• RTM use was highest for older and more medically complex beneficiaries, bucking a common stereotype that older adults aren’t willing to engage with digital care practices. 
  

The Clinical Value of Remote Therapeutic Monitoring

The Petersen Report confirms what we’ve long believed: RTM is a powerful tool to improve patient outcomes, particularly for musculoskeletal (MSK) conditions. According to the report:

• “[RTM] can improve chronic disease management, identify when patients need to seek medical attention, and inform providers about patients’ self-management.” 

Providers can use RTM data to enhance clinical decision-making, identifying when patients need escalated care, such as situations where their conditions worsen and require follow-up. RTM helps them access objective, real-time data on patient activity, pain levels, and recovery trends.

• “For the treatment of common musculoskeletal conditions, there is promising evidence that patients who use RTM solutions experience greater improvements in pain and function than those who receive only in-person physical therapy. These improvements are likely because RTM users have better adherence and complete more frequent exercise sessions.”

RTM also improves patient engagement and adherence with real-time tracking of exercise completion, pain levels, and mobility to encourage accountability. Patients enrolled in RTM receive reminders and feedback, which can improve adherence to home exercise programs.

• “Evidence suggests that remote monitoring has the greatest impact on a patient’s health when used by a healthcare provider for a focused period of active monitoring and management.”

Another benefit is increased access to care, which is critical for patients in rural or underserved areas, whose only healthcare lifeline might be a critical access hospital up to 25 miles away. Hybrid care with RTM support reduces travel burden for those with mobility limitations, busy schedules, or unreliable transportation.

• “Remote monitoring can improve access to care and treatment adherence, promote care coordination with their providers, and potentially reduce unnecessary visits—particularly for patients with difficulty accessing care.”
  

RTM also bridges the gap between clinic visits, offering better continuity of care, continuous support, and oversight, and providers can adjust treatment plans dynamically without waiting for the next scheduled appointment.

• “A recent search identified more than 180 companies now supporting RPM or RTM billing in the United States. These solutions also aim to increase provider payments, with marketing messages that promise to increase revenue and maximize return on investment. A provider can earn more than $1,100 per patient per year billing remote monitoring services in Medicare.”
  
  

RTM is recognized by Medicare and many private payers with specific CPT codes, allowing providers to be reimbursed for remote monitoring services.

For fee-for-service organizations, this adds additional reimbursement opportunities. Incorporating RTM can offer additional financial incentives that help offset the cost of digital platforms and other operational costs.

For those under value-based care, RTM adds additional cost-efficiency by potentially reducing the need for frequent in-person visits, lowering overall care costs.

In both cases, RTM is flexible enough to provide benefits for various reimbursement models, while also helping to keep patients engaged between visits—a win-win for clinicians and organizations.

How Medbridge Helps Improve Care With Remote Therapeutic Monitoring

The report also revealed an important detail that healthcare organizations need to consider when deciding how to proceed with remote therapeutic monitoring: “Not all remote monitoring tools perform equally, even if targeted to the same condition. Products vary in their underlying model of care, including what additional services are embedded in a platform, how the services are organized and targeted, and who is responsible for delivering them.”

So what sets Medbridge apart for remote therapeutic monitoring?

• With Medbridge Pathways, you can easily enable RTM for patients and automatically collect patient engagement data as they progress. Pathways has been built from the ground up to support highly engaging and effective digital care, and enables you to easily monitor your patients, message them, and ultimately drive better adherence, which leads to better outcomes.

• Our Pathways programs are designed to be one to four months in duration, depending on the condition. For example, our MSK pain pathways are one to two months in duration, while our osteoarthritis pathways are longer (two to three months) to match the fact that OA tends to be a chronic condition. This aligns with the clinical evidence in the report suggesting shorter episodes of two to four months for people with musculoskeletal conditions during targeted physical therapy.

• Pathways cover the most common MSK conditions, and our Home Exercise Program solution will help you bridge the gap with custom programs for less common MSK conditions. In addition, we have Pathways for fall prevention, pelvic health, and post-surgical care—common conditions in the Medicare population who also benefit from RTM.

• Pathways empowers your providers to own the data monitoring and response, rather than outsourcing it. This leads to better patient experience, as well as more control and visibility into how your patients are doing.

• The patient record and dashboard enable you to see all of your patients’ data in one place, which provides a hub for providers to monitor patient progress, get feedback, automatically track monitoring time for easier documentation, and document their interactions for codes 98980 and 98981. Providers can interact with patients in Pathways via messaging in between visits, which they can use to check on patients’ status, respond to feedback, and more. With Pathways, you get a digitally engaging platform for hybrid care that provides a single place to track RTM codes and then easily document them over to the EMR.

• On top of that, Pathways includes patient-reported outcomes, which offer valuable data and feedback to help providers personalize care. By capturing these insights alongside engagement metrics, Pathways allows clinicians to monitor progress more effectively, adjust treatment plans in real time, and improve overall patient outcomes. Patient-reported outcomes also allow clinicians to better demonstrate the effectiveness of remote monitoring and digital care.
  

Conclusion

The Petersen Report reaffirms the power and potential of RTM to improve patient engagement, outcomes, and satisfaction, all while boosting revenue. With the growth of patients receiving RTM services, as well as the steady increase of monitoring duration, there is significant opportunity for healthcare organizations to use RTM to reach more patients and help them get the care they need.

Ready to take the next step with RTM? Schedule a demo today to learn how Medbridge can help.



References

_{1. Gruner, Marc P., Nathan Hogaboom, Ike Hasley, et al., “Prospective, Single-Blind, Randomized Controlled Trial to Evaluate the Effectiveness of a Digital Exercise Therapy Application Compared with Conventional Physical Therapy for the Treatment of Nonoperative Knee Conditions,” Archives of Rehabilitation Research and Clinical Translation 3, no. 4 (December 2021): 100151. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.arrct.2021.100151. 21 Chen, Fang, Cynthia V. Siego,} 

_{2. Carolyn B. Jasik, et al., “The Value of Virtual Physical Therapy for Musculoskeletal Care,” American Journal of Managed Care 29, no. 6 (June 2023). https://doi.org/10.37765/ajmc.2023.89375.}