Telehealth is broadly defined as the use of communication technologies to provide health care and support at a distance. Telehealth has become a valuable tool in improving health thanks to combined advances in various areas, including communications, computer science, informatics, and medical technologies.
Telehealth can be as simple as two nurses talking on the phone about a patient’s care or as complex as using robotic technology to perform surgery from a remote site. Today, telehealth is often associated with remote monitoring of a patient’s condition; For example, blood pressure, heart rate, and other measures of health status can be obtained through a device worn by the patient and sent electronically to the health care professional.
Teleconsultations allow a nurse in a rural area to receive advice from a specialist who may be in a distant location, about patients with special or complex conditions. Such consultations can be as simple as a phone call. Increasingly, they involve more sophisticated input of medical information, such as CT scans or ultrasounds. These images can be taken by the local doctor, incorporated into an electronic medical record, and sent to the specialist for diagnosis and treatment recommendations.
Telehealth is being called to be one of the strategies aimed at improving access to health services in a timely and quality manner , especially for sectors with complex geographical access conditions.
The modality of providing health services remotely has been appearing on the health scene with increasing prominence. It is evident that the evolution of ICT and the increase in its accessibility rates has allowed the creation of much more timely spaces for patient-nurse, or nurse-nurse, communication, reducing limitations of place and time , which can be critical for the analysis. diagnosis and treatment plan of a clinical case.
In absolute numbers, there is a deficit of health professionals in relation to the growth of the population that demands their services. This trend is even greater within the different specialties; Telehealth is an alternative to mitigate this need.
Annually, the American Telemedicine Association ATA presents trends and advances regarding the topic. There is an innovative range in the evolution of diagnostic and therapeutic equipment : from stethoscopes, electrocardiographs, otoscopes, digital microscopes, to robots for telepresence among other devices, with connection interfaces that allow their results to be transmitted through different media . Its interaction with mobile technologies such as smartphones or tablets enables a new way of approaching the nurse-patient relationship and m-health for health care.
At a global level there are different references in Telehealth cases, there are important experiences in Teleradiology such as diagnostic image reading services that are provided from India to the USA, Telemonitoring services at home with different applications that are promoted from the OTN Ontario Telemedicine Network in Canada, and different modalities that are being used in Denmark promoted by the Medcom project.
The benefits that can be achieved with Telemedicine service modalities are undeniable, however, although a Telehealth project is qualified by the use of technology, its objectives must focus on the care process, accompanied by a definition of new models of care . service for users and patients which will involve managing physical, technical and human resources of the referral and case reception centers.
In the planning and execution, the managers, sponsors and directors of a Telehealth project have a great responsibility . A practice to avoid is the overestimation of technological infrastructure resources without previously identifying the operation, control and management scenarios that frame a new type of telemedicine service. Although the technological aspect can be overcome, the biggest drawbacks in projects of this type can be found in the operationalization and maintenance of the service : scheduling processes, clinical history registration, informed consent, timely response and follow-up of cases, digital signature, must be taken into account together with the technological components and their interaction with the technological platform.
Telehealth projects generate value, which cannot be referred to the price-per-activity variable alone. There are important savings and payments for specialized services, but the ROI of a project of this type is not necessarily linked to the number of activities carried out , this aspect can even make it vulnerable for its sustainable model. Perhaps the permanence of a project of this type is viable, due to its capacity to generate greater opportunities in the service. This value is highly appreciated, especially for an integrated network of health services or a service complementation model; there are great challenges and opportunities here.