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The Telemedicine Program at The Ottawa Hospital (TOH) has grown steadily in the last 10 years.
The patient on the phone began to cry when the nurse from The Ottawa Hospital offered her a telemedicine appointment, rather than having to book a flight from Thunder Bay to see a specialist in Ottawa.
“She was so thankful. She said it would save her so much money and stress because she also had to organize childcare for her kids,” recalled Anca Anghel, Clinical Telemedicine Nurse. “Now the appointment was 15 minutes away from her home.”
Anghel hears many expressions of gratitude from patients about telemedicine, now celebrating its 10th anniversary at The Ottawa Hospital. Instead of travelling to Ottawa from all over Ontario and Nunavut, patients can go instead to a local medical centre where a nurse connects them via videoconference to hospital specialists.
It saves patients a lot of time and expenses such as travel costs, childcare, missed work, and sometimes missed work for a companion. A 2014 patient satisfaction survey found 92 percent of patients were happy with their telemedicine visit.
“It’s been steadily increasing,” said Anghel. Currently, 66 clinical services at the hospital use telemedicine to connect with about 725 patients per month, compared to 2006 when the total number of patients seen was 651.
Telemedicine visits can sometimes be a better option than having a patient travel. For example, a neurologist said his telemedicine visit with a patient with dementia in a Pembroke nursing home was the best visit he had ever had with that patient – the nursing home manager participated and gave the doctor background information that allowed for a holistic assessment.
Anghel said telemedicine at the hospital continues to grow by integrating into more outpatient clinics and services.
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