C
MMUNITY BUILDER Extra
Saturday, January 30, 2010 8 Pages
Alexandria Detroit Lakes Morris New York Mills Park Rapids Perham Wadena
Doctoring from a distance Patients, hospitals embracing telemedicine
NATHAN BOWE
nbowe@dlnewspaper.com
What do hospitals in Detroit Lakes, Perham, Wadena, Alexandria and Morris all have in common? They all use technology or visiting specialists to improve patient care. When it comes to so-called “telemedicine,” or getting patients and doctors together using special cameras and TV monitors, Tri-County Hospital in Wadena is the undisputed champion of the region.
Telemedicine involves the use of special cameras and equipment. Here, Tri-County Hospital Outreach Services nurse Lynae Maki uses a hand-held camera to show the specialist a close-up of the skin.
And why not? Thanks to federal grants, the hos-pital has run a successful telemedicine program since 1995. Robin Klemek, RN manager for telemedicine at Tri-County, has been with the program since the hospital first linked to specialists from the University of Minnesota Medical Center that were already seeing patients in Wadena. Telemedicine incorporates “live, interactive audio and video,” Klemek said. “It’s used around the world — we’ve come a long way in 15 years.” The hospital sets up “consults” or clinics with medical specialists through special video conferencing technology. “The real benefit is it’s going to save that patient the travel and time needed to see the specialist,” Klemek said. It also allows doctors to make the best use of their time: They can be seeing patients through telemedicine instead of spending “windshield time” on the road. Perhaps surprisingly, patients like the interactive set-up. “We have a 99.8 percent patient satisfaction rate with telemedicine,” Klemek said. It works especially well with dermatology, in which special cameras allow doctors to get a good look at skin problems, and with psychiatry. In the usual setup, the patient can see two monitors, one of the doctor and one showing what the doctor is seeing.
Photos provided
Lynae Maki, LPN, Tri-County Hospital Outreach Services nurse, demonstrates how a typical telemedicine unit is set up, with interactive monitors that let the “patient” see both the “doctor” and the close-up that the doctor can see on his monitor. Telemedicine is the use of electronic information and communication technologies to provide and support health care when distance separates the participants. Particularly in rural areas, it offers the potential of both improved access to care and improved quality of care.
Because the telemedicine sessions occur on a regular basis, the program can cut down the time it takes to see a specialist, said Cindy Uselman, RN manager for grants and program development at Tri-County. “A lot of time if you want to see a specialist, the wait can be three to six months before you can even get in,” she said. Quicker access through tele-
medicine “benefits our patients immensely,” Uselman added. After Sebeka lost its retail pharmacy, Tri-County stepped in and its clinic there now runs a telepharmacy, with a hospital pharmacist overseeing a tech at the clinic who fills the bottles. The bottle labels are typed up in Wadena and printed in Sebeka. Patient pharmaceutical counseling is
done via an interactive setup. As part of several three-year federal grants over the years, Tri-County has helped other medical facilities set up telemedicine units. It doesn’t currently have a telemedicine grant, but it still serves as a popular resource for those interested in the program. See TELEMEDICINE on PAGE 5
Cataract, macular degeneration advances taking place
A microscope can allow optometrists to determine the health of the eye.
Technological and surgical advances in eye care have made it one of the darlings of the medical field.
BRIAN HANSEL
brianh@wadenapj.com
The complete absence of eyeglasses may not be on the horizon but reducing how much people have to wear them is already a reality. “I think there will always be a need for glasses,” said Dr. William Hartman of the Neitzke Eye Clinic in Wadena. “But how much a person wears them might be the true question.”
Eye surgery has been a darling of the medical field for many years. Lasik surgery is being done on the cornea to correct refractive errors. Present-day cataract surgery involves using an ultrasound probe and a process called fakoemulsification to break up the cataract for easy removal. What was once major surgery is now a condition that patients recover from completely within a few days. “With a lot of the cataract surgeries that we are doing
nowadays the results are such that people are satisfied with their vision without any glasses on for distance things,” Hartman said. “That doesn’t mean their vision is perfect but their vision is a lot better than it was. They might need some reading glasses when they read.” Dr. Brian Schmidt of Lake Region Hospital in Fergus Falls is an ophthalmologist who is quite impressed with the research being done in the field of macular degeneration.
Photos by Brian Hansel
Macular degeneration is an eye problem that affects older adults. The “wet” type of macular degeneration can progress quickly because of bleeding into the macula of the eye, according to Schmidt. “There are some drugs that can be injected into the eyeball. They can stabilize, and in some cases even improve, the vision of people with macular degeneration.” Presently the injections have to be carried out on a fairly regular basis and for
the rest of a person’s life. Research may not provide a complete answer but drugs may be coming that will not have to be injected as often. “That is a big improvement over what it was a few years ago,” Schmidt said. There is also a possibility that the injectables used to treat macular degeneration can be used to help people who lost their vision because of diabetes. Still being researched is a procedure that could someday help people who are completely blind. “You can actually implant a device into the eye that is like an artificial retina and it’s like an electro microcircuit chip that can then be connected to the visual cortex of the brain and allow the patient to have
Photo provided
Dr. Brian Schmidt
some very rudimentary vision and maybe even see motion and even a little bit of shapes,” Schmidt said. “It is not restoring sight or normal vision but a little bit of vision.”
Wadena Pioneer Journal office: (218) 631-2561 • Fax: (218) 631-1621 • Web site: www.wadenapj.com • E-mail: PJeditor@gmail.com or classifieds@wadenapj.com