Telemedicine as a Tool for Rural Assistive Technology Service Delivery

The current trend of cost containment in health care has prompted a search for innovative methods of providing the best quality care at the lowest possible cost. One method that has received much attention is the use of telemedicine to conduct evaluations at rural locations. The use of a telemedicine link to connect a specialist in a large city to a local practitioner in a rural location has the potential to decrease travel costs while at the same time improving the quality of care by providing the patient with the expertise of the specialist, without the burden of travel or waiting for a chance for the specialist to travel to the rurual location. There has been much research conducted in the area of telemedicine for radiology, and some other medical specialties, however there has been very little research of telemedicine in rehabilitation and assistive technology evaluations. This project proposes to evaluate different types of telecommunication links for their effectiveness in performing evaluations. Protocol methods for performing rehabilitation evaluations through telemedicine will also be investigated. Lastly, the investigators will work closely with other developers of rehabilitation evaluation tools to ensure that the future telemedicine system is compatible with these tools.