Telemedicine journal and e-health : the official journal of the American Telemedicine Association
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Follow-up of pediatric patients after an emergency department (ED) visit is important for monitoring changes in patient health and informing patients of test results conducted during the visit. The telephone has been the standard method of communication, but contact rates are poor. We conducted a survey to assess pediatric caregiver attitudes toward and access to alternate electronic communication modalities after a pediatric ED encounter. ⋯ Caregivers of children have access to the Internet and mobile phone technologies, and many would be interested in communicating with healthcare providers following an ED visit. Cell phone and text-messaging technologies appear to be more available than e-mail and may serve as an underutilized contact method. A combination of modalities directed by caregiver preferences may improve ED follow-up contact rates.
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This study aims to examine the technical quality of videoconferencing used in hospice to engage caregivers as "virtual" members of interdisciplinary team meetings and their impressions of telehealth. Furthermore, it aims to compare the quality of plain old telephone service (POTS) and Web-based videoconferencing and provide recommendations for assessing video quality for telehealth group interactions. ⋯ This study highlights the potential of telehealth to improve communication in hospice and the need for new tools that capture the quality of video-mediated communication among multiple stakeholders and strategies to improve the ongoing documentation of telehealth group sessions' technical quality.
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Randomized Controlled Trial
Telemedicine pre-anesthesia evaluation: a randomized pilot trial.
Pre-anesthesia evaluation allows discovery of conditions affecting perioperative planning, but when inadequate it may be associated with delays, cancellations, and preventable adverse events. Not all patients who could benefit will keep appointments. Telemedicine pre-anesthesia evaluation may provide for safe patient care while reducing patient inconvenience and cost. Herein we investigate the impact of telemedicine pre-anesthesia evaluation on perioperative processes. ⋯ Telemedicine and in-person evaluations were equivalent, with high patient and provider satisfaction. Telemedicine provides potential patient time and cost saving benefits without more day of surgery delay in our system. A prospective trial of patients from multiple surgical specialty clinics is warranted.
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Abstract Objective: To compare medical knowledge acquisition among emergency medicine (EM) residents who attend weekly core content lectures with those absent but asynchronously viewing the same lectures in a Web-based electronic platform. ⋯ In an EM residency program, asynchronous Web-based learning may result in medical knowledge acquisition similar to or better than attending traditional core content lectures. The percentage of curriculum delivery by asynchronous learning that may be used to achieve overall terminal learning objectives in medical knowledge acquisition requires further study.