Offered Services
Tele-counselling
General hospital specialists or exceptionally a General Practitioner requests the opinion of the tertiary hospital specialists on a clinical case. The service can be provided according to various modalities:
Asynchronously (secure e-mail type interaction). The requesting professional sends the query to the tertiary hospital specialists and waits for a reply. The maximum delay in replying to a query must have been agreed beforehand between the requester and the tertiary hospital. Both the request and the counsellor answer make use of standard forms, agreed among all the actors involved in the tele-counselling. Such forms must contain all the clinical and anamnesis information needed to provide a feedback through tele-counselling. Moreover such forms must be validated through digital signature according to EU and national regulations. Results from diagnostic procedures (e.g. X-Ray, lab results, E.C.G., etc) as well as excerpts from the patient?s clinical records can be attached to the form. As an alternative, temporary remote access to the patient?s clinical records can be provided to the specialist through an adequate authentication procedure;
Interactively (through videoconferencing facilities). In this case the healthcare professionals can talk and see each other and thus share information about the patient. They are even able to work on the same item while being at different hospitals (?whiteboard? feature), seeing e.g. where the other has put the cursor. This modality normally requires booking an appointment with the tertiary hospital specialist as in the case of a normal referral unless standby or emergency arrangements are in place between the requesting party and the tertiary hospital.
Telelaboratory
The Tele-laboratory service allows to carry out tests which are usually executed inside a clinical laboratory practically in any place thanks to portable analysis equipment which can be checked remotely, data transmission and a PKI infrastructure which guarantee the authenticity the confidentiality and the legal value of the data transmitted.
Notification services
This family of services will notify the referring medical doctor (general hospital specialist or GP) about relevant events concerning the evolution inside the tertiary hospital of the patient they have referred. Three types of events requiring notification have already been identified in a previous eTEN project (C³ - Comprehensive Continuous Care):
Notification of Admission;
Notification of Transfer;
Notification of Discharge (this includes death as one of the possible reasons for discharge).
Virtual referral
General hospital specialists or exceptionally a General Practitioner carries out a virtual referral with the tertiary hospital specialist while the patient is in his/her clinic. This service normally requires booking an appointment with the tertiary hospital specialist as in the case of a normal referral unless standby or emergency arrangements are in place between the requesting party and the tertiary hospital
Shared clinical records
A referring general hospital specialist and tertiary hospital specialists will have access to the same set of a patient?s clinical records during a virtual referral or during the entire stay of the patient in a tertiary hospital. This will allow the referring specialist not to lose touch with his/her patient.
