Van Zandt VA Medical Center officials enjoyed Wednesday’s visit from T.E.D.
Telehealth Education Delivered (T.E.D.) is a mobile demonstration vehicle designed to showcase the many telehealth solutions available within the Department of Veterans Affairs.
The T.E.D. mobile van helps raise awareness and understanding of how telehealth can improve overall efficiency of health care, while enhancing patient access, outcomes and experiences.
Through virtual technology, VA is able to deliver care to patients where and when they need it. The goal is to save veterans from traveling to a VA medical center for routine and non-emergent health care. Telehealth is beneficial for many health care services including mental health, rural health, wound care, audiology, primary care, non-invasive cardiology and dermatology, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs website.
“When I heard it was coming, I couldn’t wait to see it; I wanted to see for myself what technology they have to offer,” said Director Sigrid Andrew.
T.E.D. travels across the country to visit VA medical centers.
“We go to different ones every day and do demonstrations for providers and patients to show them what the VA is doing. People don’t realize how much telehealth the VA is doing,” said Leslie Fernyhough, telehealth education specialist for Iron Bow, the VA’s national telehealth equipment contractor.
Kymberly Hambleton, Van Zandt’s telehealth coordinator, was also excited to see what T.E.D. had to offer.
“I think this is wonderful; it is a great opportunity for us to access services that people in the urban areas have. Part of the plan is to look at what is available. We will work with providers to determine what we can use,” Hambleton said.
The Van Zandt VA Medical Center serves about 27,000 veterans in 14 counties, said Andrea Young, hospital spokeswoman.
“Twenty percent of our veterans used our telemedicine services last year,” Young said.
Currently, Van Zandt provides telehealth services in behavioral health, endocrinology, neurology, physical therapy, nutrition services, cardiology, geriatrics and hepatology.
Programs being developed include a chemotherapy infusion clinic, wound care clinic and home sleep apnea testing and follow-up.
The goal is to further expand those services at Van Zandt.
“We are looking to expand a lot of services at the Altoona center. We will need some of the technology offered within these four walls,” Andrew said. “We can use telemedicine with any VA facility in the United States, and I intend to do that.”
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Walt Frank
Quelle/Source: Altoona Mirror, 16.11.2017
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