News & Events

There are meetings that you go to once or twice and never return and others that you just keep going to year after years for decades. The American Telemedicine Association (ATA) Annual Conference and Trade Show falls into the latter category for many of us. I think this year was my 20^th year – but who’s counting! Why do I keep going back? Over the years the meeting has changed in many ways – growing from a small but growing gathering of those already involved in telemedicine to a large and growing gathering of everyone from the seasoned telemedicine aficionado to the green novice just trying to figure out what it’s all about.

$363. That’s how much a single stolen patient health record is worth on the dark market, according to data from the Ponemon Institute, making it worth more than any other piece of data from any other industry. In fact, your medical information is worth 10 times more than your credit card number.

As healthcare becomes increasingly more digital through EHR adoption and telemedicine applications, the information systems the data runs on are becoming more vulnerable to cyber attacks.

Telehealth is offering improved access to healthcare services across America. Information and communication technologies are now becoming more affordable, easier to use, secure, and applicable to a broad spectrum of healthcare services, providing the right care, at the right time, and the right place. In light of these advances in telehealth, developing new state legislation that facilitates the meaningful use of telehealth is becoming even more important in order to appropriately address barriers and gaps in care to all citizens. Successful legislation should address, at least in part, the Triple Aim: 1) Improve the patient’s experience with the health system that is more patient centered, 2) Improve health outcome, community and public health, 3) Decrease costs without sacrificing quality.

To respond to the growing need for intensivist support among many facilities in the mountain west, a new service has been created within the University of Utah Health Care's extensive Telehealth System. When a regional hospital lacks intensivist coverage, their primary ICU attending is out sick, the local pulmonologist goes on vacation, or an expanding community ICU service finds itself short-handed, the University of Utah’s TeleICU program is here to help.

The TeleICU program has been implemented for just over a year, with many success stories. Many patients who otherwise may have been transferred to a tertiary center have been able to stay in their community hospitals, near family and support systems, while providing revenue for the local hospital. This virtual intensivist coverage allows our affiliate facilities to function at the top of their skill set, and patients that do require transfer to a larger center can be more rapidly identified.

The benefits of telemedicine and telehealth have been clearly supported over the past 20 years with more than 20,000 research papers published. Telemedicine reduces barriers to care, improves patient access to specialists, helps medical practitioners expand their practice reach, and can realize substantial cost savings for healthcare systems and patients.

As the technology has become more affordable and generic, and states enact parity legislation, the market for commercial telemedicine specialty services is exploding—and this can be a very good thing for healthcare systems, hospitals, clinics, and other organizations facing healthcare provider shortages. But with so many telemedicine service providers out there, the challenge is narrowing down the field to the one that will best fit your organization, your community, and your patients’ needs.

We all know how teleradiology has impacted the care of human patients for the past 15 years or so and driven the field of telemedicine to the advanced state it is now, but what about our animal friends who get sick and need care when they live out in rural areas?

Not surprisingly (or maybe for some it is) telemedicine is a rapidly growing part of veterinary medicine, and as with human medicine, radiology is leading the way.

The need for genetic counselors is immense as there simply are not enough to cover the number of patients requiring their services.

Sound familiar? Can you think of a solution? Telegenetics of course!

But as we all know, you can’t just jump into telemedicine without some degree of training. That’s where the Western States Genetic Services Collaborative (WSGSC) comes into play.

Later this spring, Critical Access Hospital (CAH) administrators, state Flex program staff, and rural health care leaders will gather to share information and best practices with their peers at the Western Region Flex Conference at Tucson’s Ritz-Carlton Dove Mountain Resort. 

Attendees will not only learn what CAHs in the western half of the US are doing to preserve essential medical services in their communities, but will also learn about the latest state and national health policy developments and their impact on rural health care from nationally-recognized experts such as Keith Mueller from the University of Iowa and the Rural Policy Research Institute and John Supplitt from the American Hospital Association. The conference will also showcase successful efforts undertaken by rural providers and communities in the western US to overcome barriers to implementing and sustaining telemedicine services.

It’s a long way and lots of hours flying from Tucson, AZ to Muscat, Oman but I had the great opportunity and pleasure to attend the 7^th International Conference on Health Issues in Arab Communities with five of my colleagues from the University of Arizona.

It has taken quite a while, but the FDA has finally released a document that may help pave the way for whole slide imaging pathology system approval. On February 25^th they released the “Technical Performance Assessment of Digital Pathology Whole Slide Imaging Devices Draft Guidance for Industry and Food and Drug Administration Staff”.