Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center is preparing to launch a new telemedicine unit focused on intensive care.
Telemedicine, basically doctor’s visits by video conference, is a growing trend in healthcare -- and now Dartmouth-Hitchcock is hoping to use it to support intensive care units all over the region.
Instead of video-conferencing with a patient at home, intensive care specialists at Dartmouth-Hitchcock will connect with other doctors and nurses around the region to provide on-demand consultation.
Kevin Curtis is an emergency medicine physician at Dartmouth-Hitchcock.
“So it could be a nurse says, 'I’m trying to remember if these three medications given by IV are all compatible. And remind me of the drip-rate.’”
The program hopes to increase access to healthcare in rural areas by allowing more patients to be treated at local clinics.
“This program allows us to take advantage of some of the expertise here, both for physicians and for critical care nurses, and scale that to the region to support whatever the local bedside teams are.”
The on-call specialists will also have access to real-time data from patients, so they can proactively reach out to local doctors if they identify an issue.
The program will begin in July of next year.
