What is Telehealth?
 

Telehealth, also known as telemedicine, is the providing of health care, health information, and health education across a distance, using telecommunications technology, and specially adapted equipment.  It allows physicians, nurses, and health care specialists to assess, diagnose and treat patients without requiring both individuals to be physically in the same location, regardless of whether that distance is across a street, across a city, across the state, or across continents.

Telehealth brings specialized medical care directly to the people who need it.

Telehealth can:

• Prevent unnecessary delays in receiving treatment;

• Reduce or eliminate travel expenses;

• Reduce or eliminate the separation of families during difficult and emotional times;

• Utilize the services of healthcare providers in locales where the supply of physicians  
     may be adequate or at a surplus; and,

• Allow patients to spend less time in waiting rooms.

There are many applications for providing health care or telehealth across a distance, including:

• Monitoring patients with chronic conditions or at-risk populations;
• Medical care for home-bound patients or those in rural, remote, or frontier locations;
• Mental telehealth for incarcerated populations;
• Access to medical care in areas with provider shortages; and,
• Availability of expert consultations via satellite for individuals on the battlefield, cruise ships, space stations, research stations, and other inaccessible locations.

Currently, telehealth is practiced in many settings, such as rural hospitals, school districts, home-health settings, nursing homes, cruise ships, on the battlefield, and even on NASA space missions.  Telehealth is well-established in certain disciplines, such as radiology and dermatology, and is being expanded in other disciplines, for example, home telehealth, mental telehealth, ocular telehealth, teledermatology, telepathology, telerehabilitation.  It is being utilized further for specific populations, including individuals who are incarcerated or live or are stationed in remote locations.

The use of advanced telecommunications technologies to exchange health information and provide health care services across geographic, time, social, and cultural barriers:

• Telephone, radio, other voice modalities;
• Picture phones, teleconferencing;
• Fax, Emails;
• Computers for data/imaging;
• Interactive video; and,
• Virtual reality, tele-robotics.

The underlying concept of telehealth has traditionally described the use of technology to provide clinical medical services when the healthcare provider and patient are separated by geographic distance.  In recent years, the term telehealth has risen as a favorable expansion upon telehealth.  Telehealth not only includes clinical services but also non-clinical medical services such as education, research, and administrative functions. (Source: The Association of Telehealth Service Providers)

Telehealth is generally described as the use of communication equipment to link health care practitioners and patients in different locations.  This technology is used by health care providers for many reasons, including increased cost efficiency, reduced transportation expenses, improved patient access to specialists and mental health providers, improved quality of care, and better communication among providers.

Electronic information and telecommunication technologies are used to support long-distance clinical health care, patient and professional health-related education, public health and health administration.  Telehealth represents a valuable resource for delivering health-related services to remote, underserved areas, providing greater access to health care for consumers and health professionals.

What are the Different Types of Telehealth?

• Tele-Dermatology;
• Tele-Radiology;
• Tele-Nursing or Ask-a-Nurse;
• Tele-Psychiatry;
• Tele-Dental;
• Tele-Ophthalmology; and,
• Tele-education / Continuing Education.

Where is Telehealth Practiced?

• Rural, Remote, Frontier
• Urban
• Military: Battlefield, Ships
• Emergency responders
• Bioterrorism
• Ship-to-Shore: Cruise ships, Tankers
• Schools
• Extreme: Antarctic, Space, Underwater
• Prisons
• Hospitals

How is Telehealth delivered?

Telehealth primarily uses videoconferencing equipment.  This is an interactive technology and enables patients and health care providers at distant sites to interact “face-to- face”.  Technological advances now allow for these interactions to occur using a desktop computer.  An alternative to real-time telehealth is called “store-and-forward”, in which clinical information is sent (like email) to a provider at a distant site for their evaluation.  This does not allow for a dialogue between the patient and provider.