A growing number of hospitals are relying on remote ICUs to monitor and evaluate patients virtually, which helps to cope with an unrelenting COVID-19 caseload.
Tag Archives: Video Consultations
TELEMEDICINE: A REVIEW OF 9 CONDITIONS THAT CAN BE TREATED ONLINE (VIDEO)
TELEMEDICINE is here to stay! With all its’ advantages Patients will demand It!
This video is one of the few to highlight WOMENS’ HEALTH as an appropriate field for Telehealth. A remote visit first may at least let the Doctor order some tests that will accelerate your care.
Urinary problems can also be appropriate for telemedicine; the MEDICAL HISTORY is such a VALUABLE DIAGNOSTIC TOOL!
Psychological and Psychiatric care could be completely remote, by telemedicine. The Doctor could save on expenses, and deliver care less expensively.
Distance disappears as a barrier to Consultations and second opinions. A University medical center or prestigious multi specialty Clinic are on your doorstep.
Of course, barriers remain in the form of regulations, litigation, bureaucracy, and Insurance, but these can be overcome, if the Will is there.
—Dr. C
TELEMEDICINE BENEFITS: PATIENT’S “CONVENIENCE & SAFETY” TOP THE LIST
From a Permanente.org online article (May 11, 2020):
“Our patients are glad we offer telehealth options because they don’t want to come to the medical centers. This allows them to stay home and stay safe,” Dr. Lee says. “Before, telehealth was a choice and convenience, but now it’s one of the ways patients remain healthy with social distancing.”
The majority of telehealth visits are phone appointments, but Dr. Lee says video usage is increasing as more patients become comfortable with the platform.
Telehealth can also include services such as remote patient monitoring, which allows patients to take blood pressure measurements and blood sugar readings at home so that their care teams can monitor ongoing health conditions. In the case of the Kaiser Permanente Mid-Atlantic States region, doctors also use telehealth to do rounds virtually for patients who have suspected or confirmed COVID-19.
Patients at higher risk for complications are given pulse oximeters so their doctor can monitor for signs of severe respiratory infection before other symptoms might indicate a need for additional care, including hospitalization.
COMMENTARY
TELEHEALTH is HERE TO STAY. It came in with the telephone, and has been gaining in recent decades. The distancing and Patient convenience so characteristic of Telehealth made it a natural fit for Covid 19, which has accelerated its’ adoption.
Your CLINICAL HISTORY, led by the Story of your Present Illness, has since time immemorial been the MOST IMPORTANT ELEMENT leading to accurate DIAGNOSIS. During a TELEMEDICINE VISIT, your doctor must make the MOST out of your clinical history. She can’t do a proper Physical Exam, although she can usually see you, and maybe direct a SELF exam. Teledata, such as EKG,B.P., and blood sugar will become increasingly available.
Your Doctor can usually get enough information to order Lab work and Imaging; and prolix ordering can be tempered, since a good HISTORY of the PRESENT ILLNESS, systems review, past and family history can narrow the diagnostic possibilities considerably. The pressure of time and demanding computer Records may lead the overworked Doctor to use Lab Tests to make up for insufficient Medical History.
Integrated medical systems, such as Kaiser, can also easily access your past medical information, one of the advantages of having everything under one roof.
Informed Patients, SELF-EDUCATING themselves from the vast trove of medical information on the internet (and maybe DWWR) can author their own MEDICAL NARRATIVE, or at least make the Doctors job easier.
—Dr. C.
TELEMEDICINE “LANGUAGE” SKILLS WILL CONTINUE TO INCREASE AT A RAPID RATE
From a New York Times article (May 5, 2020):
“Calling my patients at home, with or without video, has become my new normal. After 25 years of being a pediatrician, telemedicine is teaching me new ways to communicate with families.“
“I try to hear the mother above the babbling of her baby. And then to listen to the babbling of the baby. Is it joyful? Are there big breaths between the babbling?“
A federal government waiver, issued early in March, expanded the use of federally funded health insurance — Medicaid, Medicare and the Children’s Health Insurance Program — to pay for telemedicine visits. The goal was to allow more people with symptoms of illness to be heard, and sometimes also seen, by a health care provider without the risk of exposure to coronavirus at a doctor’s office or hospital.
The federal government has been expanding the use of telemedicine for years — but like so many changes in this pandemic, what used to take years to transform, we are now doing within weeks.
Doctors Without Waiting Rooms 