[LINK] How far the fibre?

[Glen Turner]

On Mon, 2007-07-02 at 20:16 +1000, Craig Sanders wrote:
> not very useful for acute appendicitis, or a car crash, or poisoning or
> any of the many other things that require on-the-spot expertise, right
> now...rather than booked days or weeks in advance.

If you have an acute problem in a remote area (and increasingly
in regional areas) medical treatment is aimed at stabilisation
prior to evacuation to a large city. For example, a traffic
accident followed by helicopter transport of the acutely injured.

Paramedics in this situation are already doing telemedicine.
They communicate by radio back to the emergency ward, who
suggest diagnoses and suggest and approve more exotic
treatments (such as various cardiac drugs).

Where telemedicine comes to the fore is the steps after critical
care. The post-recovery consultations. If all is going well, then
you don't want to drive to the city to be told that all is going
well or for a slight change in a drugs.

Also, to be blunt, acute care isn't the issue in regional
Australia -- that's going to be done in the city just because
of the huge investment needed.  It's the next rung down --
specialist diagnosis and treatment consultations, psychological
evaluations and care, and so on.

There's also a nasty flip side to all of this, the Dark Force
of international telemedicine. Let's say a bird flu outbreak
occurs. Do you want to be risking your specialist medical staff
with direct contact with the infected?  You might rather
teleconference up to the isolation ward of the same hospital.
Or better still, to some hospital in China, working to defeat
the outbreak before it spreads.

Best wishes, Glen