Overall description
cntd ...These advances make affordable the extensive application of telemedicine solutions in their various declinations (e.g. distance learning, protocol based shared clinical records, tele-consultation, second opinion, etc.) to several branches of medicine (e.g. cardiology, neurology, respiratory diseases, etc.).
The rational deployment of telemedicine could thus allow Local and Regional Health Authorities to optimise their size, their workflows, the quality and the geographical distribution of their specialty teams on the basis of the expected needs of the population to assist rather than on the basis of physical proximity to citizens.
The use of telemedicine would thus allow access to highly trained specialists through the deployment of an adequate communication network and a set of applications, which will reduce to a bare minimum the need for a patient to travel long distances in order to physically see a specialist.
The possibility for a Local or Regional Health Authority to reduce the number of specialty centres in the geographical area they cover, would allow each centre to reach an optimum concentration of skilled medical resources in spite of the general scarcity of specialised medical doctors that affects most European countries.
Moreover experience has shown that a high concentration of specialists in the same field in a single physical location sparks a self-fertilisation process, which continuously improves the quality of the specialty team.
HEALTH OPTIMUM intends to carry out an in-depth analysis of the current organisational structures in the targeted countries, to identify and market validate the most suitable suite of telemedicine services able, on the one hand, to rationalise their internal organisation and bring a substantial reduction of running costs and, on the other hand, to improve citizens? access to high quality healthcare service.
HEALTHcare delivery OPTIMisation throUgh teleMedicine
