Abstract
Mortality and morbidity from traumatic injury are twofold higher in rural compared to urban areas. Furthermore, the greater the distance a patient resides from an organized trauma system, the greater the likelihood of an adverse outcome. Delay in timely diagnosis and treatment contributes to this penalty, regardless of whether the inherent barriers are geographic, cultural, or socioeconomic. Since ultrasound is noninvasive, cost-effective, and portable, it is becoming increasingly useful for remote/underresourced (R/UR) settings to avoid lengthy patient travel to relatively inaccessible medical centers. Ultrasonography is a user-dependent, technical skill, and many, if not most, front-line care providers will not have this advanced training. This is particularly true if care is being provided by out-of-hospital, “nontraditional” providers. The human exploration of space has forced the utilization of information technology (IT) to allow remote experts to guide distant untrained care providers in point-of-care ultrasound to diagnose and manage both acute and chronic illness or injuries. This paradigm potentially brings advanced diagnostic imaging to any medical interaction in a setting with internet connectivity. This paper summarizes the current literature surrounding the development of teleultrasound as a transformational technology and its application to underresourced settings.
Highlights
Despite revolutions and quantum leaps in the development of technology and health care systems, disadvantaged populations, separated from the mainstreams of modern technology by either geography, duty, choice, or fate, bear an increased burden of mortality and morbidity [1]
Ultrasonography is a user-dependent, technical skill, and many, if not most, front-line care providers will not have this advanced training. is is true if care is being provided by out-of-hospital, “nontraditional” providers. e human exploration of space has forced the utilization of information technology (IT) to allow remote experts to guide distant untrained care providers in point-of-care ultrasound to diagnose and manage both acute and chronic illness or injuries. is paradigm potentially brings advanced diagnostic imaging to any medical interaction in a setting with internet connectivity. is paper summarizes the current literature surrounding the development of teleultrasound as a transformational technology and its application to underresourced settings
While these initial efforts were supported by all the technical infrastructure of National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), advances in connectivity, accessibility, and availability of hand-held computing and communication devices are making real-time mentored tele-ultrasound (RTMTUS) a service that can be brought to R/UR settings in a back pack or even a pocket and potentially used by any nontraditional care provider on any patient [17,18,19]
Summary
Despite revolutions and quantum leaps in the development of technology and health care systems, disadvantaged populations, separated from the mainstreams of modern technology by either geography, duty, choice, or fate, bear an increased burden of mortality and morbidity [1]. Us, in the absence of any other diagnostic imaging resources, accurate diagnosis can still be made for most of the medical conditions that might arise in low Earth’s orbit [13,14,15,16] While these initial efforts were supported by all the technical infrastructure of NASA, advances in connectivity, accessibility, and availability of hand-held computing and communication devices are making real-time mentored tele-ultrasound (RTMTUS) a service that can be brought to R/UR settings in a back pack or even a pocket and potentially used by any nontraditional care provider on any patient [17,18,19]. Other investigators have utilized a variety of commercial video-streaming devices to transmit real-time streaming ultrasound images over either the internet [33] or satellite transmission [34, 35], with potential remote guidance potentially conducted by telephone or without a video camera depiction of the user [34, 35]
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