Benefits of Telemedicine

Benefits of TelemedicineIntroductionLong take safeguarding period and extensive travelling follow expect been some of the most signifi crumbt problems faced by the public health around the world. These dogged handgrip lists and travel personifys are not only a hurdle to the enduring but likewise to the economy, resulting in considerable productivity loss. These issues gift been addressed in a cast of researches, recommending various strategies and policies (British capital of South Carolina Medical Association, 2006 Adamu Oche, 2013). However, technology can play a vital role in eliminating travel costs and waiting magazine by implementing telemedicine.Telemedicine can be defined as The delivery of health like run, where distance is a critical factor, by all health care professionals using information and conversation technologies for the exchange of valid information for diagnosis, treatment and prevention of disease and injuries, research and evaluation, and for th e continuing education of health care sufferrs, all in the interests of advancing the health of individuals and their communities (WHO, 2010, p.9).It is especially beneficial for people residing in under-developed, slight economically developed or remote and rural areas of developed countries that lack basic or specialist healthcare. It is an effective means of trim down travel costs as well as consultation wait time (Ontario Telemedicine Network, 2012).BackgroundTelemedicine is a relatively new field and has the potential to address various barriers in administration of quality healthcare and enable equitable access to health. However, cost- forcefulness studies are of supreme importance for grand adoption of telemedicine and to convince physicians and policy makers of its persuasiveness. Without any information on the cost-effectiveness of telemedicine policy makers, decision maker, implementers run the danger of supporting telemedicine systems that are not perceptive to he althcare needs of the patient and which do not deliver cost-effective services either from patient or provider perspective (Hailey, 2005). Most of the empirical studies on cost-effectiveness of telemedicine are either based on assumptions, weak evidence and inadequate details on believe design and methodologies or narrow perception on the outcome. Whitten et al. (2002) undertook a systematic redirect examination of cost effectiveness studies, and set several articles that met their selection criteria. Most of the studies provided no details of sensitivity analysis, none employed cost utility analysis and no study adequately compared telemedicine services to traditionally organized health care. Thus, last that there is no good evidence that telemedicine is a cost effective means of delivering health careTelemedicine costs are mainly determined by the scale and utilization of the service. For example, if a large number of patients use telemedicine service, the cost of the service would significantly decrease. Mistry (2011) highlighted that many studies fail to define what is meant by cost-effectiveness or provide a cost-effectiveness threshold. Furthermore, his analysis defined that cost-effectiveness of telemedicine depends not only on the service being assessed, patient pigeonholing and sample size, type of economic analysis and how the costs and outcomes are measured, but also on the engage rate and the usage of the service.Cost-effectiveness of telemedicine may vary according to it usage in sub-specialty such as teleradiology (WHO, 2010), telepsychiatry (Spek et al., 2006), teledermatology (Loane et al., 2001) etcetera, as concluded by a systematic review that the potential effectiveness of telemedicine could only be credit to teleradiology, telepsychiatry, transmission of ECHO images and consultations between primary and guerrillaary health providers (Roine, Ohinmaa Hailey, 2001). According to a systematic review by Wade, Karnon, Elshaug Hiller (2 010), real-time telemedicine was cost-effective for home care but not for local delivery of services between hospitals and primary care. Similarly, in a cost study by Lamminen, Lamminen, Ruohonen Uusitalo (2001) concluded that benefits and savings deliver the goods through teleconsultations included reduction in travel costs and paperwork as well as time savings for the patient, with an addition benefit of mendd medical learning.Use of telemedicine in chronic pain worry has yield worthwhile results as patients suffering from chronic pain often find it back-breaking to travel long distances for treatment. Telemedicine delivered to such patients for pain management, irrespective of their geographical location, were 56% satisfied as compared to the 24% of traditional in-person clinical visits, resulting in significant cost advantage for patients and attendees (Pronovost, Peng Kern, 2009). Pronovost et al. (2009) also inferred that significant improvement on a patients financial b udget was a likely factor for greater degree of telemedicine patient satisfaction as compared to in-person clinical visit group. Chan, Woo, Chan Hjelm (2000) in a study for cost effectiveness of geriatric teledermatology concluded that travelling to see a dermatologist is a hurdle, for the elderly and disabled patients, which can be cost effectively resolved by teledermatology. Hayward Mitchell (2000) in their cost effectiveness study for teleradiology identified tangible benefits from patient perspective as decrease costs of travel and accommodation, need for childcare and time off from work. Intangible benefits included faster management of medical problems, minify anxiety as second opinion is rapidly provided, equitable access to specialist level opinion.A retrospective study from 2005 to 2012 examined the cost effectiveness of telemedicine diabetes consultations and concluded that telemedicine setup was associated with improved cost effectiveness and patient satisfaction. It emphasizes that patient satisfaction was in the beginning related to the major decrease in travel time, which accounts to a full working day (Levin, Madsen, Petersen, Wanscher Hangaard, 2013). A systematic review on cost comparison between telemonitoring and usual care of heart ill luck inform that all studies reviewed found a reduction in costs that ranged from 1.6% to 68.3%. These cost reductions were largely attributed to reduced hospitalization and travel costs. It was found that 55% of the patients were willing to open $20 and 19% were willing to pay $40 to access telemedicine instead of traveling to the physicians office (Seto, 2008). Similarly, a study reported 24% cost saving of cost per year of patients using telemedicine (Zanaboni et al., 2013).Transportation savings using telemedicine have been noted in several studies- Maass, Kosonen Kormano James Folen study (as cited in Whitacre, 2011, p.176). Thaker, Monypenny, Olver Sabesan (2013) included various costs in t heir cost savings teleoncology rooml from one-time costs to running costs and found that it provides considerable savings, compared to the usual mode of healthcare delivery. Savings were attributed to reduced patient travel, along with an escort, to a tertiary center, avoiding of overnight accommodation, aeromedical retrievals as well as reduced visits from a specialist. It emphasizes that the net savings are mainly due to reduced patient travel and this model can be applied to geographically distant rural areas, which direct lengthy travel.Research has shown that the avai research lability of telemedicine allows rural areas to offer a larger variety of healthcare services, improve the overall perception of healthcare quality Rickets study (as cited in Whitacre, 2011, p.172) and increases equality between citizens as medical expertise becomes available irrespective of patient location (Maass, Kosonen Kormano, 1999). It impacts the economy of a rural fraternity by reducing trave l that lowers transportation costs and decreases missed time from work increases local drugstore and lab work and provides saving to the hospital by out-sourcing telemedicine procedures. Increase in local pharmacy and lab work has a financial impact on the local economy which is mainly because telemedicine patients do not leave their local areas to receive their original diagnosis hence any resulting follow-up work ends up at the local pharmacy or lab (Whitacre, 2011). One of the major points of telemedicine adoption is abridging distances thus reducing productivity loss and delivering high quality health care outside the healthcare center. It highlights that since telemedicine reduces the number of visits, it consequentially reduces travel expenses as well as productivity loss (Fusco, Trieste Turchetti, 2013 Deshpande, Khoja, Lorca, McKibbon, Rizo Jadad, 2008).