Telemedicine helps save time and lives in smaller hospitals

Telemedicine – using high speed Internet to connect patients and doctors – is not a new idea. But it is becoming more commonplace in smaller hospitals where doctors with lifesaving specialties are not always immediately available in person.

Milton Hospital in Milton, Massachusetts recently spent $25,000 installing a portable computer screen, video camera, microphone and high speed Internet connection in the emergency room. These new telemedicine tools can connect Milton Hospital in seconds to Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital in Boston, where there are more doctors in different specialties who can consult when time is an important factor and there are no minutes to spare waiting for an on-call doctor to come in.

"When it comes to strokes and heart attacks, every minute counts," said Mary Keady, Milton Hospital's managing emergency room nurse. "It's the difference between a person being completely well … or being totally debilitated."

In the U.S. alone there are over 200 networks linking clinics and hospitals to other, usually larger hospitals. Telemedicine is not only linking hospitals to hospitals. It is additionally being used in homes with patients who have pacemakers and are being monitored at a hospital through a high speed Internet connection.

Due to increased use and technological developments, telemedicine is becoming more widespread and inexpensive to use. The more hospitals that adopt the idea and become members of a network the more are able to provide higher levels of often life saving care to their patients. John Looney, spokesman for Jordan Hospital in Plymouth, Massachusetts, puts it simply, "It saves valuable time and it saves lives."

Telemedicine saves lives (Citizens1st.com)

Telemedicine (Speed Matters)