ehealth Program in Georgia E. Kldiashvili Georgian Telemedicine Union (Association) 7 April, 2006, Luxembourg

Transcription

1 ehealth Program in Georgia E. Kldiashvili Georgian Telemedicine Union (Association) Med-e-Tel 2006, April, 2006, Luxembourg

2 The state of health of population is a direct determinant of country development Access to better healthcare services redounds to poverty reduction and increased productivity Investment in healthcare is a prerequisite to economic and social progress

3 Many developing countries have inadequate healthcare and medical services The inadequate infrastructures of telecommunications, roads and transport make it even more difficult to provide healthcare in remote and rural areas and to transport patients properly Developing countries face various problems in the provision of medical service and healthcare

4 For countries with limited medical expertise and resources, telecommunications has the potential to provide a solution to some of these problems Telemedicine services have the potential to improve both the quality of and access to healthcare regardless of geography Healthcare professionals can be more efficient

5 In the developed countries, there has been a rapidly growing interest in telemedicine and ehealth as means to ease the pressure of healthcare on national budgets Some of the technologies and experiences of the developed countries could help developing countries in their desire to provide, especially, primary healthcare Telemedicine and ehealth have many socio- economic benefits But these fields need to be implemented carefully and managed well The impact of telemedicine on healthcare structures can be significant

6 The telemedicine industry appears to be growing rapidly, judging by the growing number of conferences on the subject and World Wide Web sites dealing with telemedicine services The developed countries of North America, Europe, Japan and Australia have considerable experience in telemedicine and ehealth The European Commission has supported a large number of telemedicine/ehealth ehealth projects

7 There are many telemedicine and ehealth applications, some with very sophisticated and expensive technologies Telemedicine applications using virtual reality technologies are being developed and demonstrated in the USA and UK Such sophisticated and expensive technology is out of reach of developing countries They need the low cost, sustainable solutions to the delivery of medical and healthcare as well as access to appropriate expertise, especially in the event of emergencies

8 The success of a telemedicine service will depend heavily on which technologies and services are used, on how appropriate they are to particular countries, recognizing that the situation may differ from country to country

9 In Georgia there were implemented two ITU supported telemedicine projects The first one involved the connection of the Institute of Radiology in Tbilisi to the Diagnostic Imaging Centre in Lausanne, Switzerland via the Internet in order to acquire medical second opinions The second project Telecardiology,, has implemented the simple method of ECG transfer using ordinary telephone receiver. It was partly funded with excess revenues generated by the ITU Telecom exhibitions

10 But in Georgia there were implemented other telemedicine projects too National Association of Cancer Control established communication and conducted teleradiological and telemorphological conferences Heart and Vascular Clinic uses Agfa Deluxe Slide Scanner for teleradiology Emergency Cardiology Center and National Information Learning Center are implementing telecoronography transfer of X-ray X images for second opinion Center of Disaster and Emergency Medicine has developed software and tested TelCoNet Teleconsultation network project for emergency medicine

11 Since 2005 Georgian Telemedicine Union (Association) is implementing NATO Networking Infrastructure Project Virtual Health Care Knowledge Center in Georgia At 2005 Black Sea Economic Cooperation (BSEC) project A A System to Fight HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria in BSEC Countries with the Help of Info- Communication Technologies was realized

12 The hard social-economic situation in Georgia and unenviable inheritance has an effect upon today s s status of healthcare in the country The lack of the newest information is obvious Due to the geographic features of the country there are some remote regions in Georgia Healthcare is centralized in Georgia

13 Georgia is technologically prepared for the introduction of telemedicine The optic-fiber magistral (STM-4 4 and STM-6 systems of SDH generation) in Georgia includes different interurban directions Three international directions are implemented: 1) Russia, NIS, Europe, other world 2) Tbilisi-Armenia 3) Tbilisi-Azerbaijan

14 The services of Georgian Internet providers include: 1) Dial-up 2) Leased line 3) DSL 4) Wireless communication Two GSM operators Geocell and Magticom are acting in the country. Both of them have GPRS service. In the country there are used decade-step automatic phone stations, coordinate automatic phone stations, electron automatic phone stations and digital automatic phone stations

15 Georgia is characterized by the limited medical expertise and resources, but well- developed telecommunication possibilities Telecommunications have the potential to provide a solution ehealth has the potential to improve as the quality so the accessibility of medical service in the country

16 There are some telemedicine applications with very expensive and sophisticated technologies. They are well- used in the most of developed countries, but out of reach of developing countries For the purpose of effective and adequate introduction and implementation of telemedicine developing countries need low cost and sustainable solutions, which can be easily adopt with the existing hardware The success of telemedicine will depend upon the choice of hardware and software and its appropriateness to the country

17 The partnership with the foreign colleagues has decisive role at each step of telemedicine introduction and development in Georgia Telemedicine is the most important for the ensuring the safe primary medical care in the country The first contact of patients needing medical help is the contact with the local primary healthcare center Second opinions from specialists are often required in primary healthcare centers

18 Georgian Telemedicine Union worked out the concept ehealth Program It defines the priorities and aims of ehealth network creation in the country The implementation of this concept will ensure the increasing of medical service level and its accessibility to population Distance medical consultations and trainings are the integral and key activities of program implementation

19 ehealth Program is an adequate tool to provide specialized knowledge to remote places The ehealth Program will ensure the common medical-communication communication space in the country, the approach which can be effectively used for Georgia territorial unity restoration

20 Thank you, very much for attention! Any question?