The Future of telehealth is here

[Kavsuvb]

Can you imagine the day when you can do a Zoom, Facetime, or Skype call with Med control while en route to the hospital and the doctor can see in real-time what you're doing in the back of the ambulance?

Rural SD Medics Get Long-Distance Help in Treating Man Gored by Bison - JEMS: EMS, Emergency Medical Services - Training, Paramedic, EMT News

Medics had a doctor looking over their shoulders inside the ambulance as they transported a man gored by a bison to the hospital.

www.jems.com

EMS Telemedicine | South Dakota Department of Health

Introducing Telemedicine in Motion: EMS - Connect with Avel eCare's experts via iPad for high-quality, reliable telehealth services in South Dakota.

doh.sd.gov

 

[DesertMedic66]

This has already been going on for many years. I remember reading about multiple services in the US who video contact a stroke team during transport and complete a NIHSS among with any other assessments that are needed. Then once they get to the hospital it is direct to CT to R/O a bleed and then immediate TPA/TNK or if it’s an LVO then it’s straight to neuro IR for thrombectomy.

At my agency we have also had our medical directors guide us through some rare procedures, that we don’t have protocols for and aren’t officially trained on, by using a video conferencing application.

 

[FiremanMike]

My experience in the ED with tele-neuro has been less than impressive. They basically redo the NIH stroke exam that we’ve already done, review the CT scan that a radiologist has already read and reported to the ED doc, and recommend or don’t recommend TNK based on criteria that we already follow.

Those with first hand experience with teledocs in the ambulance may have a different view, but I picture it playing out similarly.

 

[Tigger]

I worked at a place with a very robust telehealth program that was based on referral from 911 crews. Sometimes the crew would still be on scene and give a hand off to the community paramedic, other times the CP would call the patient and set up a time for a later evaluation after the 911 crew did a refusal. During the telehealth visit the provider online would ask all the questions and CP would obtain vitals, EKG, lab draw, etc and report those to the provider. Pretty seamless.

 

[Akulahawk]

Telehealth programs can be a good thing or, well, not so good a thing. Where I currently work, we use use telehealth to consult with (usually) cardiology or neurology. Sometimes they'll do a NIHSS exam and sometimes they'll do their own variation of it along with seeing the CT results. Mostly this speeds up the process of accepting a patient to a tertiary facility as the receiving physician has already examined the patient through a remote means.

Field referrals, clinic referrals with a PA/NP staffing the clinic, and very specialized consults is where I think telehealth programs will shine. In some instances, it may speed up transfer of a patient to a tertiary/specialty center because the receiving physician will have already "seen" the patient.