Health untethered

Telemedicine may be defined as ldquothe use of electronic communications to provide or support healthcare at a distancerdquo. It originated when an unknown patient somewhere called an unknown doctor for advice. For the last almost hundred years, mainstream telemedicine was traditionally associated with videoconferencing. In the last ten years the Internet and wireless mobile communications technology has radically changed our concept of telemedicine, its value in healthcare and its use by the average person, so much so that we are now referring to it as telehealth. The technologies being used to support telemedicine was explored, and the possible changes they are enabling in healthcare was described. But there are technical, legal and business challenges which must be dealt with in order to arrive at our vision of the future.