Evolving Health Care Case Study

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EVOLVING TELEHEALTH NURS 315- INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IN NURSING HEALTH CARE April 21, 2013 MY TELEHEALTH PAPER Scenario: You are the nurse practitioner in St. Theresa's emergency department. A client is brought in with obvious psychiatric problems. You have no psychiatrist available and the nearest psychiatric facility is a 1-hour drive away. St. Theresa is a Tri-State Health Care Alliance Member. Tri-State has telehealth links with the regional hospital, where a psychiatrist is in the emergency department. What steps would you take to initiate a productive teleconference? Justify your response. My scenario; A 43 year old female presents to the ER, brought by the police after being involved in an altercation at a bar. The patient…show more content…
Malcovich of this patient’s presentation early on in her visit allowed him to investigate the details of her health and psychiatric history. He was also able to check laboratory and test results and have complete access to up-to-the-minute patient care notes. This allowed him to begin contemplating patient management options. St. Theresa’s, unfortunately does not offer inpatient psychiatric services. Therefore, once medically cleared, we have to rely on inpatient psychiatric facilities or group homes like the one Dr. Primrose runs to ensure that these patients remain safe while, in this case, initiating prescriptions to manage medical and psychiatric issues and gathering resources that will be necessary for this patient to regain her independence. This teleconference was efficient and cost effective for the following reasons; an unnecessary one hour trip was avoided to the facility where no beds were available. This patient was able to receive appropriate, necessary medical treatment while psychiatry was reviewing the patient’s chart and then, in this case, finding appropriate placement. The two Psychiatrists involved were able to teleconference with the patient and gather necessary information and details of the patient’s present state of mind and ability to act with sound judgment. The patient’s accessible EMR avoided time spent faxing and/or having to orally present patient’s case several times over. Teleconference allowed access to a knowledgeable, Psychiatrist…show more content…
Again, this sounds great. What the many articles repeat over and over is that telehealth will save time and cost and make healthcare more efficient, accessible and effective for the patient. I do not doubt that this will eventually happen. However, I think it will take a long time just as we have seen with the evolution of the EMR and a centralized system. I do think that the availability of EMR will aide greatly in the practice of telehealth and telemedicine in that while conferencing, practitioners will have access to that patient’s

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