Applying telecommunication technology to health-care delivery

The term telemedicine refers to the utilization of telecommunication technology for medical diagnosis, treatment, and patient care. Telemedicine enables a physician or specialist at one site to deliver health care, diagnose patients, give intra-operative assistance, provide therapy, or consult with another physician or paramedical personnel at a remote site. Thus, the aim of telemedicine is to provide expert-based health care to understaffed remote sites and to provide advanced emergency care through modern telecommunication and information technologies. This article briefly describes the current status of telemedicine, including its implementation, acceptance, patient satisfaction, service and applications, system configuration and requirements, and research issues to be resolved.