Telehealth Essay

Telehealth is considered as a tool that could exert a positive impact on several dimensions of health care services delivery in rural, remote and isolated regions. It provides delivery services in a timely fashion for remote populations, facilitates access to education for clinicians, and save travel costs for patients and professionals. For instances, in Canada, many telehealth projects take place in rural, remote or isolated populations and various telehealth applications have been implemented and have shown promising outcomes. However, telehealth utilization remains limited in many settings, despite increased availability of technology and telecommunication infrastructure. A qualitative field study conducted in four remote regions of Quebec, exploring perceptions of physicians and managers regarding the impact of telehealth on clinical practice and

These regions also combined various practice settings in urban hospitals, semi-urban hospitals, and rural and remote health centers.
Participants were identified through personal contacts from members of the research team, lists of telehealth conference participants, and documentation on telehealth projects and through snowball method which solicits referrals from initial participants to generate additional subject. The interview schemas were previous research done and they were divided into three parts. The first part comprised questions about actual practice, motivations for practicing in the remote region, motivations for staying in the region, as well as potential factors that could make one leave the region. The second part dealt with the quality of life at work and the effects of telehealth on clinical practice. The last part of the interview covered perceptions about the benefits, limitations and the conditions that would facilitate telehealth integration into clinical work. Potential