Program Description – Telemedicine and Videoconferencing Services
Benefits – Telemedicine and Videoconferencing Services
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Benefits of Rural Telemedicine Programs:
- Keep patients in their own communities for health care when feasible.
- Provide specialty care services to rural areas.
- More efficient use of medical resources which may lessen amount of travel time for specialists and patients.
- The on-site primary care provider receives quick, efficiently guided consults.
- Primary care providers find that treatment of subsequent patients with similar presenting symptoms can be handled with more efficiency and less need for specialist input.
- Improve patient and family involvement in their own care.
- Reduced physician isolation in rural areas.
- Increased financial viability of rural medical facilites.
- Strengthen the rural economy by keeping the flow of financial resources in the local communities.
- Continuity of patient care is enhanced when the patient, primary care physician, specialist, and family are all involved during the consultation. If patient requires transfer to a tertiary facility, they have already met the physician who will be caring for them, thus offering reassurance to the patient.
- Strengthen the relationships between rural facilities and St. Alexius Medical Center, which may also increase referral base for St. Alexius and associated physicians.
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Benefits of Nursing Home Telemedicine Programs:
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- Provides medical services at the point of care, where the patient resides, with all the comforts of home.
- Allows the nursing home resident’s nurse to participate in the “clinic visit” and discussion with the attending physician, which improves the continuity of care.
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- Limits the physical hardship which can sometimes accompany a trip to the clinic, especially in adverse weather.
- Provide follow-up support services such as: hospice care conferences, continence management services, post surgical clinic visits, physical therapy, respiratory care.
- Time savings when seeing residents whose mobility is quite impaired.
- Decrease frequency of transporting residents for routine clinic visits.
- Decrease the occurrence of extended periods of time spent in waiting rooms.
- Improved quality, efficiency and continuity of care to nursing home residents.
- Determine if the nursing home resident needs emergency care.
- Improve collaboration with nurse practitioners/physician assistants, when applicable, to provide optimal patient care.
- Professional development and other educational training.
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