Paediatric palliative care by video consultation at home: a cost minimisation analysis

Background: In the vast state of Queensland, Australia, access to specialist paediatric services are only available in the capital city of Brisbane, and are limited in regional and remote locations. During home-based palliative care, it is not always desirable or practical to move a patient to attend appointments, and so access to care may be even further limited. To address these problems, at the Royal Children's Hospital (RCH) in Brisbane, a Home Telehealth Program (HTP) has been successfully established to provide palliative care consultations to families throughout Queensland

Home telehealth and paediatric palliative care: clinician perceptions of what is stopping us?

Background: Advances in technology have made the use of telehealth in the home setting a feasible option for palliative care clinicians to provide clinical care and support. However, despite being widely available and accessible, telehealth has still not been widely adopted either in Australia or internationally. The study aim was to investigate the barriers, enablers and perceived usefulness for an established home telehealth program in paediatric palliative care from the perspective of clinicians

Telemedicine – a bibliometric and content analysis of 17,932 publication records

Objectives: We aimed to provide an up-to-date contemporary bibliometric view of the Received in revised form telemedicine and telehealth literature and a longitudinal analysis of changes in content 30 June 2014 themes. Accepted 2 July 201

The case for home based telehealth in pediatric palliative care: a systematic review

Background: Over the last decade technology has rapidly changed the ability to provide home telehealth services. At the same time, pediatric palliative care has developed as a small, but distinct speciality. Understanding the experiences of providing home telehealth services in pediatric palliative care is therefore important

Assessment of self-perceived knowledge in e-health among undergraduate students

Growing research evidence shows the value of e-health in healthcare delivery. While efforts are made to implement e-health in mainstream healthcare, relatively modest attention has been paid to develop e-health knowledge and skills in health practitioners. Using a pre-post design, in this study, we aimed to examine self-reported knowledge and perception changes associated with an e-health course offered to university undergraduate students in Australia.Pre- and postsurveys were used to examine self-reported knowledge and perception changes relating to e-health among undergraduate students. All students enrolled in an e-health course (n = 165) were asked to complete an identical survey in the first and last week of the semester.The response rates were 53% (n = 87) for the presurvey and 52% (n = 85) for the postsurvey. For all items, changes in self-reported knowledge and perception were statistically significant in pre/post median scores and dichotomized negative/positive proportions.Students believed the course helped them to improve their knowledge regarding key aspects of e-health. It is important to design an e-health curriculum targeting competencies to provide necessary knowledge and skills to help students practice e-health in their professional careers

Clinical use of Skype: a review of the evidence base

Skype is a popular and free software application thatallows PCs and mobile devices to be used for video communication over the Internet. We reviewed the literature to determine whether the clinical use of Skype is supported by evidence. One small (n ¼ 7) controlled clinical trial had assessed the effect of nursing communication using Skype on elderly patients with dementia and their carers. However, we were unable to identify any large, well-designed studies which had formally evaluated the safety, clinical effectiveness, security and privacy of Skype for the routine delivery of patient care. While there were many case reports and small studies, no firm evidence either in favour of, or against the use of Skype for clinical telehealth was found. The risks and benefits of using Skype for clinical purposes are not known

The use of telemedicine for delivering healthcare in Japan: Systematic review of literature published in Japanese and English languages

Background In common with other countries, Japan has an ageing population and geographical impediments to healthcare access. The role of telemedicine within the Japanese health system may be of wide interest, yet it has not been comprehensively explored and documented. Thus, the aim of this study was to systematically review the Japanese and English language literature relating to the clinical use of telemedicine in Japan. Methods For studies published in Japanese, we searched Ichushi and CiNii. For English language publications, we searched Cochrane Library, PubMed, Embase, and Web of Science. All peer-reviewed articles describing the clinical use of telemedicine and published between 2007 and 2016 were included. Data on clinical area, study type, technology used, and type of communication were extracted. Studies were categorised by prevention, screening, diagnosis, surveillance, and treatment. Results The search yielded 1476 records; 26 Japanese language and 15 English language articles were selected for review. A wide range of clinical areas were represented; however, home care and life-style related studies were dominant. More than 50% of studies were related to prevention and early diagnosis. The majority of Japanese studies involved doctor-to-doctor consultation. Smartphones and remote monitoring systems were the main types of technology used. Conclusions Most studies of telemedicine in Japan are published in the Japanese language and are thus relatively inaccessible to the rest of the world; for the first time, this study has provided an overview of the clinical use of telemedicine in Japan. The clinically related papers reflect the Japanese cultural focus on disease prevention