Staff perceptions of emergency and home-care telemedicine

The utilization of a low-bandwidth telemedicine system for emergency and for home-care was studied in a pilot trial. The emergency setting was the emergency department of a small urban hospital and its emergency medical service (EMS); the home-care setting was the home-health agency affiliated to the hospital. Utilization data were obtained through baseline and follow-up interviews with EMS technicians, emergency department and home-health nurses, and the project coordinator. The results indicated that initial enthusiasm for the use of the telemedicine system was not followed by a commitment to the system's utilization during the trial by the relevant administrations. Barriers to optimum utilization were identified, but the actual value of the system to patient care could not be determined. We conclude that the value of a telemedicine system to patient care cannot be realized unless there is an organizational commitment from the top to system utilization.