People with heart failure could be monitored at home by means of a device implanted in their bodies.
The procedure seems to help prevent patients needing readmission to hospital – as it can allow problems to be detected early, researchers report today.
But experts warned of untested risks of implanting a device in a sick patient’s body.
The device measures the pressure in the arteries of the chest and some 83 patients tested it in the US trial.
A report in The Lancet says that over six months it reduced hospital admissions by 30 per cent – compared with a similar group of 120 patients who did not have the implant.
Amy Thompson, of the British Heart Foundation, urged caution.
She said: "Telemonitoring, in which patients self-report their symptoms and are often telephoned at home by medical staff, has already shown positive benefits for heart failure patients in the UK.
"This interesting study considers a possible next stage, where an implanted device also records internal pressures which can give an earlier indication of problems.
"While this research finds the wireless device reduces hospitals admissions for some people with moderate heart failure, it requires an invasive procedure and the researchers did not measure its impact on long term survival rates.
"We’d need to see much more research and larger trials before we could be confident this is a practical next step for monitoring heart failure patients."
Researcher Dr William Abraham, of Ohio State University, Columbus, USA, said: "The Champion trial represents the first positive, randomised, adequately powered clinical trial of implantable haemodynamic monitoring in patients with moderately symptomatic heart failure.
"The addition of information about pulmonary artery pressure to clinical signs and symptoms allows for improved heart-failure management and leads to a reduction in heart-failure-related hospitalisations."
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