Cisco HealthPresence Telemedicine Mobile Clinic on a Roll
Cisco and UnitedHealth Group this week showcased the latest in telemedicine—a ‘Connected Care’ mobile clinic that links patients to healthcare services they might not otherwise have access to because of time, distance or other constraints.
Connected Care, a partnership between Cisco and UnitedHealth Group, is the first national telemedicine network. The goal is to deliver high-quality healthcare services in a variety of settings, including rural, retail and workplace environments, where in-person physician visits might not be possible or practical.
The mobile clinic is equipped with Cisco HealthPresence, a telemedicine implementation of Cisco TelePresence that offers patients virtual face-to-face consultations with doctors located elsewhere. Remote physicians have access to a variety of diagnostic medical devices (operated by a physician’s assistant at the clinic) that are connected to the telemedicine system. For example, digital examination camera equipped with a light allows a remote physician to get a magnified, detailed view of a patient’s eyes or look inside the patient’s mouth.
The images are displayed immediately on computer screens next to the TelePresence monitors. This allows all parties in a virtual consultation to view the same information regarding the patient’s vitals at the same time.
“This can give physicians as good as a view of a patient than they’d usually get in a doctor’s office,” says Nick Augustinos, senior director of Global Healthcare Solutions for Cisco’s Internet Business Solutions Group.
What’s more, because they see on screen the same vitals that the remote physician sees, patients can better understand their conditions and make more informed healthcare choices. Patients can review their records on computer screens before, during or after a virtual consultation, adding important context to their time with the doctor.
The 18-wheeler prototype mobile HealthPresence made its first stop in Washington, D.C., on July 15th and has since rolled into Chicago, Memphis, Houston, New York and other U.S. cities before arriving in San Francisco and San Jose. Next stop: New Mexico.
Cisco HealthPresence is currently in six pilot tests. Two are in the U.S., with the rest in Scotland, France, Argentina, and New Zealand. HealthPresence will formally launch in the first half of 2010.
Mobile clinics, such as the prototype parked across the street Tuesday from San Francisco’s Ferry Building, can deliver much-needed patient care to disaster sites, said Jim Woodburn, OptumHealth’s vice president and medical director of clinical initiatives.
Moments later, as if to illustrate Woodburn’s point, an eardrum-splitting siren blared from the Ferry Building. It was the weekly test of earthquake-prone San Francisco’s emergency warning system.
Blog article by James A. Martin, a News@Cisco staff writer
Posted by John Earnhardt at 02:44PM PST
Mike Davis Nov 15, 2009
Telepresence for doctors is a great opportunity for those living in rural areas. Hopefully the cost is not too much.