Over the past few months, I’ve been doing more and more rating scales with patients. When people first come in, they download and fill out an initial form which asks the usual demographic information like addresses and phone numbers but also includes a patient health questionnaire (PHQ) . The PHQ screens for somatization disorder, panic [...]
Tagged ASRS, BPRS, disadvantages, HAMA, HAMD, MMSE, PHQ, skype, SPMSQ, YBOCS, YMRSI had an interesting phone call and email conversation the other day. It came to nothing–I didn’t feel that I could help the patient with her problem whether face to face or via telepsychiatry, but it made me think about how much telepsychiatry changes the way medicine is going to look in the future. The [...]
Tagged international, licensingIn general, the weather in Baltimore tends to be fairly temperate, but we occasionally have snow. Because we don’t have that much snow, the highway department is generally not prepared, especially right after it starts snowing, so the usual pattern is for travel during the beginning of a snowstorm to be pretty hazardous, especially when [...]
Tagged emergencies, weatherIt’s surprising how few technical difficulties my patients have had with Skype, but there have been a few. With one exception, all the technical troubles any of my patients have encountered have been the very first time that they’ve set up Skype. Although I tell everyone to test it out before they try it for [...]
Tagged skype, technical problems, webcamA recent post on the Skype site is pretty interesting: With the right gear, you’ll soon be able to make Skype video calls in 720p HD. The latest beta version of Skype for Windows now supports HD-quality video (1280 x 720 resolution at up to 30 frames per second), giving you an even smoother and [...]
Tagged HD webcam, HDTV, skypeOne of the characteristics of any part of medicine that I’m aware of is that the work tends to be “bursty,” meaning there is seldom a steady flow of work. Instead, work is often crazy busy for a while, and then not-so busy, then crazy busy again, and so on. Throughout my medical life, I’ve [...]
Tagged ER, overflow, queuing theoryI’ve been playing with Google Wave for a few days now, and I’m really intrigued with the future possibilities for using it in conjunction with telepsychiatry. It’s hard to explain exactly what Google Wave is, but I like Google’s description that it’s “what email might look like if we invented it today.” To me, it’s [...]
Tagged google, google wave, medical records, wave serverA friend sent me a link to an article in the New York times titled “Are doctors ready for virtual visits?” The article talks about the results of a study done at the University of Texas Medical School looking at the impact of telemedicine on patients in intensive care units. There were two really interesting [...]
Tagged doctor's attitudesI had an interesting experience a couple of weeks ago. A prospective patient wanted to come see me, but there was a potential problem because of the location for my office. I have my office in a professional building occupied by attorneys, accountants, therapists, doctors and businesses like staffing agencies and consumer research groups. By [...]
Tagged privacy, stigmaIn my last post, I talked about the informed consent form for my practice, and mentioned that part of the consent form says that emergency care might be more difficult via telepsychiatry. I wrote that section because I doubted that there was any case law on emergency petitions and telepsychiatry. In Maryland, certain mental health [...]
Tagged emergencies, emergency petition, face-to-face, forensic
advantages AES AFAT American Telemedicine Association atoms bits blizzard Clayton Christensen consent form countertransference digital records disadvantages disruptive innnovation dokuwiki EBM emergencies EMR encryption ER evidence based medicine face-to-face google wave HIPAA HIPPA informed consent Maryland Board of Physicians medical records office space password PHI podcast prescriptions privacy recording security shoji screen skype standard of care technophobia telephone teletransference transference ubuntu weather webcam
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