Telehealth Essay

A. Overview
The healthcare industry is a fast paste industry, always searching for better ways to provide medical treatment to patients. Telehealth is one of the newest application of Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) in healthcare. Through the development of databases and other applications, ICT also provided the ability to improve health system efficiencies and prevent medical errors. Digital technology is being used in many areas, from clinical treatment to patients to being used in medical records.

This paper will discuss how telehealth is bringing cost effective and efficiency into the health care systems. It will also tell how patients are trying to take control of their health not only by going to the doctors, but

also using the internet to do medical research on their own signs and symptoms. It will also entail how physicians are able to treat patients and get medical results without having physical contact with them. This paper will also discuss AI and telehealth are in conjunction with one another.
B. What is telehealth?
Telehealth is defined as delivering healthcare through technology such as the internet, telephone, fax, and telephone video chat lines.

Telehealth is the ability to communicate using diagnostic and information technology remotely when medical staff and patients are not in the same location or area. Health informatics, medical, nursing, surgery, diagnostics, and pharmacology are all being transformed by telehealth. Telehealth also includes telemedicine, which is the use of telecommunication and information technology to provide clinical healthcare from a distance for non-urgent issues. “Specialties that use telehealth includes radiology, cardiology, neurology, anesthesiology, mental health, pediatrics, and dermatology. The purpose of telehealth is to increase cost productivity, to cut transportation expenses, to improve patient access to specialists and mental health providers, and to have better communication with the

physicians.

C. What is Artificial Intelligence (AI)?
Artificial Intelligence, also known as AI, is computers that are programmed to perform human functions such as; speak, learn, visualize, and make decisions.

D. Early on
“In April 1924, a cover for the magazine Radio News foreshadowed telemedicine in its portrayal of a "radio doctor" connected to a patient not only by sound but also by a live picture. When this came about, people were just beginning to get radios in their homes in the United States and the first experimental television transmission did not actually occur until 1927” (Institute of Medicine, 1996).
Telehealth began long before the name telehealth came about.

According to Lustig, (2012), telehealth came about in 1879, an article in the Lancet talked about patients using the telephone to reduce unnecessary office visits, using healthcare in a home-based setting. As well as the home-based setting telehealth has been used in the clinical setting for many years. Radio was a way of sending clinical advice to medical personal on ships. “The most common current applications of telemedicine (other than general telephone and fax communications) is the radiologic image transmission within healthcare Teleradiology has been in existence for over six decades, Teleradiology allows a digital film, like x-rays and EKG’s to be read in other counties. “One of the earliest use of hospital-based telemedicine was in the 1950’s and 60’s when a closed-circuit television link was established between the Nebraska Psychiatric Institute and Norfolk State Hospital for psychiatric consultations. The internet is where most people began doing research and get most of their as medical advice. The internet is being used more now today, so with that telehealth is becoming more useful as well, but it is not new in the medical field of

technology.
E. The Benefits of Telehealth and How it is Helping in Patient Care
Digital communication such as the internet, electronic medical records and social media has transformed how healthcare is delivered. Video chats visits preserve the effectiveness and value care and reduce the cost of patient care. Telehealth is a home base setting, which is helpful to patients that do not want to physically leave their homes to go to doctor’s offices for basic questions regarding symptoms that they may be having. Some patients may find it difficult to talk to a physician's face to face because of an embarrassing issue, so calling in to a web base physician can ease the discomfort of discussing certain issues. Patients now have access to areas on the internet such as WebMD. “WebMD is health website, for consumers and medical professionals” (Gara, A., (2017). WebMD uses physicians and other health experts from different medical specialties to give online users, the medical information needed. Telehealth is helping patients by cutting transportation expenses, patients are not having to leave their homes for some medical services. Telehealth is also improving patient access to specialists and mental health providers, as well as providing better ways to communicate with physicians.
Telehealth and AI are both aimed at diagnosing illnesses faster and more accurately. “When you combine remote monitoring with machine learning, you get even better diagnoses with less specialty labor” (Reisenwitz, 2017). AI will be able to determine what doctors are best suited to answer questions regarding a patient’s symptoms verses just sending them to the first available doctor.
F. Problems with Telehealth and Self-testing
Patients are now using the internet for self-diagnosing, which can lead to misdiagnoses. Self-diagnosing can give an individual information about certain conditions, but it will not directly help with some of the things an individual can be facing (Kent, 2015). Self-diagnosing can also fail to diagnose a serious illness or mistakenly suggests that they have serious illness or diseases that you don't have. Some of the results that consumers recieve at home sometimes show accuracy in the results, however, further steps are not given for individuals to begin treatment or follow-up care. The use of telemedicine also limits the level of care patients can receive from a physician as well because there is no physical contact with the medical providers. While access to telehealth is on a rise, there are still major obstacles to initiating telehealth technology especially for small, rural providers who do not have the financial ability to purchase equipment or enhance their knowledge. According to Phillips (2015), Internists are spending more time on the computers than they are spending with patients. However, some physicians are encountering problems adjusting to the new technology. Technology can be hampered by electronic glitches, power can go out at any time, do storms or power failure. There should always be an alternative plan in these unavoidable circumstances.

G. The Cost of Telemedicine
Patients sometimes chose to use telehealth because it is cheaper than going to the actual doctor’s office. Connecting with a doctor over the phone or internet saves traveling cost and time. “According to United Healthcare data, a virtual visit is less than $50 while a primary care appointment is $80, an urgent care visit cost is about $160 and an emergency room visit can cost up to $650” Mazur, (2017).
Telemedicine and AI are both aimed at cutting costs. and diagnosing illnesses faster and more accurately, however insurance companies won’t pay for telemedicine like they pay for in-person visits. Making it problematic to pay doctors the same, which makes it difficult for providers to adopt the technology Reisenwitz, 2017.