According to Castro, D. (May, 2014), there are the functions of the Telehealth or Telemedicine that are using by the patient between the doctors. First function is the real-time services. The function is provides the activities that are using between the doctor and patients through the video conferencing or telephone, messaging and online from the website of Telehealth or Telemedicine. From that, the patients can interacting with the doctor and share the information about their health record. The patients can store-and-forward means data is sent to the web-site and then received and analyzed by a provider designated to a web-site consultant. Consultants will review the pictures and clinical data within a certain time and then return their opinion
Telehealth is the monitoring via remote exchange of physiological data between a patient at home and health care professionals at hospitals or clinics to assist with diagnosis and treatment. As our society ages and health care costs increase, government and private insurance payers are seeking technological interventions. Technological solutions may provide high quality healthcare services at a distance, utilize professional resources more effectively, and enable elderly and ill patients to remain in their own homes. Patients may experience decreased hospitalization and urgent care settings, and out of home care may not be required as the patient is monitored at home. However, no study has been able to prove telehealth benefits conclusively. This change in health care delivery presents new ethical concerns, and new relationship boundaries between health care professionals, patients, and family members. This paper will discuss telehealth benefits in specific patient populations, costs benefits of using telehealth, and concerns of using telehealth.
The purpose of telemedicine is to remove distance as a barrier to health care. While telehealth is an accepted resource to bridge the gap between local and global health care, integrating telehealth into existing health infrastructures presents a challenge for both governments and policy makers (HRSA, 2011). Today there are policy barriers that prevent the expansion of telehealth, including reimbursement issues raised by Medicare and private payers, state licensure, and liability and privacy concerns.
Patient portal is a Web-based access point which enables physicians and patients to chat and exchange health details remotely, adds an extra element for the continued handling of the patient's care. Although portals cannot substitute a face-to-face visit, they have got a lot of advantages, these are generally developed to improve patient's involvement in his or her care, portals help monitoring test results as well as health records and can also improve a regular doctor-patient discussion. Moreover, portals are effective in reducing expensive paperwork by functioning as online billing and pay centers.
Telemental Health Collaboration Protocol: What is the best way for rural nurses to help the elderly population decrease depression?
Among the main aims of health care reform and improvement is expanding healthcare access to different populations, which have been subjects to underserving for a long period. These include the poor, the previously uncovered, rural societies, and the minorities, to mention just a few. Great challenges definitely lie ahead, since several individuals start seeking access to the primary healthcare clinicians (Arnaert & Delesie, 2001). Telenursing assures to be a crucial tool to meet such needs. It refers to making use of the telehealth technology in conducting nursing practice and delivering nursing care. Because of the quick telemedicine technology adoption within the healthcare institutions, telenursing emerges as a fresh tool that provokes discussions
Telehealth involves the distribution of health-related services and information. Distribution via electronic information and telecommunication technologies. It allows long distance patient/clinician contact and care, advice, reminders, education, intervention, monitoring and remote assistance. Telehealth could include two clinicians discussing a case over video conference, a robotic surgery occurring through remote access, physical therapy done via digital monitoring instruments, live feed and application combinations, and many more. As the population grows and ages, and medical advances are made with prolong life, demands increase on the healthcare system.
Telemedicine is a new comer to the field of medicine and it is the treatment of patients by means of telecommunications technology. Telemedicine is carried out in a variety of ways whether it is by smart phone, wireless tools or other forms of telecommunications. Examples of telemedicine include: 1) transmission of medical images 2) care services at the home of the patient 3) Diagnosis at distance 4) education and training of patients. The diversity of practices in what is known as telemedicine raises many questions and one of those questions, which is extremely important, relate to the safety of the practice and the risks involved.
The economic impact of telehealth is a critical factor to examine when looking at the feasibility of incorporating such technologies into practice. Exploration of economics is also essential as it has been posited that telehealth has the potential to deliver care to individuals that is cost saving in nature (Wade, Karnon, Elshaug, & Hiller, 2010). Furthermore, the estimated expenditure on telehealth services and technology is expected to reach into the billions of dollars (Berger, 2010). However, there are myriad individual elements that may be considered in the broad subject of economics, which complicates determining the economic impact in a parsimonious way (Bergmo, 2009; Wade, et al., 2010).
“Telemedicine is the use of medical information exchanged from one site to another via electronic communications to improve patients’ health status” (Wager, Lee, & Glaser, 2013, p. 156.)
Telehealth definition according to our textbook by Hebda, T., & Czar, P., 2013 is the use of telecommunications technologies and electronic information to exchange healthcare information and to provide and support services such as long-distance clinical healthcare to clients. It provides health care to patients that may not be able to have access to care. Telehealth requires a patient to have electronic tools to facilitate this type of service. Electronic tools can be a telephone, computer, or a video camera. The patient is able to call or enable video conferencing to have access to their health care provider. Telehealth allows the patient to have access to preventative care and education on their disease process and how to manage it at home.
Televideo and Home-based Telehealth which will be used by 2025. Telehealth services use information and communications technologies to deliver health services and transmit health information over both long and short distances. It is about transmitting voice, data, images and information rather than moving care recipients, health professionals or educators. It encompasses diagnosis, treatment, preventive or educational and curative aspects of healthcare services and
Our clinical knowledge is expanding. The researcher has first proposed the concept of electronic health record (EHR) to gather and analyze every clinical outcome. By late 1990s computer-based patient record (CPR) replaced with the term EHR (Wager et al., 2009). The process of implementing EHR occurs over a number of years. An electronic record of health-related information on individual conforms interoperability standards can create, manage and consult with the authorized health professionals (Wager et al., 2009). This information technology system electronically gather and store patient data, and supply that information as needed to the healthcare professionals, as well as a caregiver can also access, edit or input new information; this system function as a decision support tools to the health professionals. Every healthcare organization is increasingly aware of the importance of adopting EHR to improve the patient satisfaction, safety, and lowering the medical costs.
E-Health is a personally controlled record secured online. Its allows a client and their doctors, hospitals and other healthcare providers to view and share their health information and the advantages of e-health are that they provide accurate, up to date and complete information of the patient at the time of their care. It enables a quick access to patient records for a hustle free efficient care and reduces medical error and provides a safer care.
From state and federal levels, the healthcare industry has come a very long way, experiencing changes along the way. The development of advanced technology that has enhanced the quality of healthcare delivery systems will help all patients to be able to benefit. Doctors are able to access patient records at a faster rate and respond to their patients in a much more timely fashion. E-mail, electronic transfer of records and telemedicine will give all patients and physicians the tools needed to be more efficient, deliver quality care and deliver quality telecommunication at a faster pace than before.
Imagine the ability to obtain healthcare services from almost anywhere in the world where you have access to a phone or computer. Now, imagine being able to provide nursing assessments, diagnosis, treatments, and recommendations to your patients from your home to almost anywhere in the world. Lauren Stokowski (2008) noted in her article that one fourth of the United States has rural residents. That number may appear small in comparison to the urban residences; however, rural residents have a tendency to to have “higher poverty rates, larger percentage of elderly, and tend to be in poorer health”. Could telenursing be a solution?