Telemedicine
Providing tele-health services using information and communication technologies (ICTs) has enormous potential for improving health, facilitating the work of healthcare professionals and helping guarantee the future sustainability and efficiency of the health system.
In spite of the potential of telemedicine and the fact that most of the technology needed to implement this type of services has, generally speaking, already been developed, its use on a regional, national and European level is still limited. Most existing telemedicine projects are localised initiatives set up by healthcare centres to answer specific problems, using the technological skills of the centre and its staff.
It seems that, in view of the technology on which telemedicine is based and its proven contribution to healthcare, this situation will gradually become generalised, at the risk of a wide range of technologically heterogeneous and mutually incompatible projects emerging which would hinder progress in the next stages of the expansion of telemedicine as a basic healthcare resource in coming years.
In this context, the IAVANTE Foundation considers that telemedicine must progress from fragmentation to integration, a transition which should be orchestrated on a government level, aiming for sustainability, flexibility and efficiency to counteract the emergence of projects with a limited lifespan, or those which can only be sustained through subsistence maintenance.
As a result, we are committed to, and consider essential, the launch of a common, integrated telemedicine platform capable of meeting the main technological challenges facing telemedicine projects, and, also of ensuring the long-term interoperability, scaleability, security and viability of telemedicine initiatives undertaken in the Andalusian Public Health System (APHS).
Such a platform would also ensure that telemedicine initiatives are aligned with the wider context of the ICT strategy of the APHS, guaranteeing the integration of corporate information systems. In addition, through the common, integrated telemedicine platform these telemedicine services could be widely incorporated in existing health management processes.
This would make it possible to include and integrate available telemedicine services. For example:
1. Incorporating teleconsulting as a means of enabling users to access the service
2. Including telemedicine as a possible scenario for activities which can be remotely controlled
3. Promoting teleconsultation between professionals as a quality feature of their activity
4. Including the use of corresponding telemedicine tools in the catalogue of general APHS competences
5. Including the corresponding telemedicine equipment and devices among resources and process requirements
All this involves making the transition from telemedicine as an independent component driven by the technological momentum paradigm, to ehealth services integrated in the digital health environment, driven by the demand paradigm.