Can Video Conferencing Be as Easy as Telephoning?-A Home Healthcare Case Study

Copyright © 2016 by authors and Scientific Research Publishing Inc. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution International License (CC BY).In comparison with almost universal adoption of telephony and mobile technologies in modern day healthcare, video conferencing has yet to become a ubiquitous clinical tool. Currently telehealth services are faced with a bewildering range of video conferencing software and hardware choices. This paper provides a case study in the selection of video conferencing services by the Flinders University Telehealth in the Home trial (FTH Trial) to support healthcare in the home. Using pragmatic methods, video conferencing solutions available on the market were assessed for usability, reliability, cost, compatibility, interoperability, performance and privacy considerations. The process of elimination through which the eventual solution was chosen, the selection criteria used for each requirement and the corresponding results are described. The resulting product set, although functional, had restricted ability to directly connect with systems used by healthcare providers elsewhere in the system. This outcome illustrates the impact on one small telehealth provider of the broader struggles between competing video conferencing vendors. At stake is the ability to communicate between healthcare organizations and provide public access to healthcare. Comparison of the current state of the video conferencing market place with the evolution of the telephony system reveals that video conferencing still has a long way to go before it can be considered as easy to use as the telephone. Health organizations that are concerned to improve access and quality of care should seek to influence greater standardization and interoperability though cooperation with one another, the private sector, international organizations and by encouraging governments to play a more active role in this sphere

Open Educational Content for Digital Public Libraries

If the production of digital content for teaching -- particularly free content -- is to expand substantially, there must be mechanisms to establish a link to fame and fortune that was not perceived in a pre-digital world. How that might be done is the central question this report addresses, in the context of examining the movement for open educational content. Understanding that movement requires delving into the history of what may seem, on first pass, a totally unrelated field of endeavor. The reader's patience is requested....

Video Conference as a tool for Higher Education

The book describes the activities of the consortium member institutions in the framework of the TEMPUS IV Joint Project ViCES - Video Conferencing Educational Services (144650-TEMPUS-2008-IT-JPGR). In order to provide the basis for the development of a distance learning environment based on video conferencing systems and develop a blended learning courses methodology, the TEMPUS Project VICES (2009-2012) was launched in 2009. This publication collects the conclusion of the project and it reports the main outcomes together with the approach followed by the different partners towards the achievement of the project's goal. The book includes several contributions focussed on specific topics related to videoconferencing services, namely how to enable such services in educational contexts so that, the installation and deployment of videoconferencing systems could be conceived an integral part of virtual open campuses