Managing Your Practice

The clear and present future: Telehealth and telemedicine in obstetrics and gynecology

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Peter Nielsen, MD: When we saw that some high-risk obstetrics patients were having a difficult time getting to our downtown San Antonio office—the trip from surrounding communities was taking too long, or city driving and parking were stressful or too costly—we looked to improve access to care. Collaborating with a health care network that has a hospital in a town north of San Antonio, we set up a pilot program to provide telemedicine perinatal consultation services.

In this kind of service, which occurs entirely in real time, ultrasound images taken at the hospital are streamed by high-speed fiberoptic cable to our office, where a maternal-fetal medicine physician views them. If a repeat image or a different image is needed, the physician requests another scan. Linked to the physician and listening through an earpiece, the ultrasonographer performs the new scan with little delay and without disturbing the patient. The conversation between physician and ultrasonographer is private.

After ultrasound scanning is complete, the patient goes to a private room at the hospital for a video conference with our physician in San Antonio, who has reviewed the images in the PACS (picture archiving and communication system) or ultrasound recording system. They discuss the images, the findings, and the follow-up.

We tested the technology during a 6-month pilot program to make sure it worked at the highest quality and safety levels. Then the program went live and we started seeing patients remotely. Now we have a robust telemedicine training capability at that hospital outside San Antonio, and we are looking to expand to other south and west Texas areas, some even farther from our office.

I have done some of these remote consultations. In response to my informal queries about the experience, patients said that no one else was offering it, and they were participating for the first time. Naturally they had questions and concerns. Nevertheless, patients, family members, and the ultrasonographer and physicians in the communities seem to think this is a high-quality, safe program that makes it easier for patients to access health care.

Patients uniformly describe these consultations in positive terms. They do not have to drive far, into the city, and deal with traffic; parking is easy and free; and less travel means much less time off from work. Given these very practical advantages, patients are interested in having more appointments done remotely. In addition, they say the appointment itself is easy, being there is effortless, and they feel their physician is sitting in the same room. It is like video chatting with family members—they are comfortable with the technology.

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The patients’ perspective

Dr. Brown: Patient satisfaction is an important issue. In psychiatry, dermatology, and other disciplines, patients have indicated that they are very satisfied with telehealth sessions. Telehealth in obstetrics and gynecology, I think, will receive similar positive feedback.

The issue of driving distance led us to reconsider the number of face-to-face prenatal visits a normal, healthy patient needs. These days, a patient can use a prenatal care app to track her weight and blood pressure and send the data to her physician. Besides being convenient, these monitoring apps can give a patient an important sense of control. Our pilot programs found that a patient who self-monitors understands her weight gain better and is more in tune with it. Apps and other technologies can thus improve quality of care and, in reducing the number of trips to an office, increase patient satisfaction.

Many people use or are familiar with the programs Skype and FaceTime (audiovideo chat software), and I envision that our postpartum task force will recommend using such programs for follow-up appointments. For each visit, the question to ask is whether the patient really needs to meet with her physician in person, or can she stay with her new baby and receive postpartum counseling at home. I am excited about the potential of telehealth in obstetrics and gynecology. Our task force is exploring that potential.

Telehealth for both routine and specialized care

Dr. Brown: Specialized care applications are here. In a pilot program in Wisconsin, a colleague has been providing remote psychiatric care. Perhaps such a program can be used to follow up on patients with postpartum depression. In addition, other psychiatry colleagues have long been using telehealth for adolescent behavior follow-ups, and we can do this too.

Another colleague has been performing remote perinatal follow-up for children with congenital anomalies. The physician interacts with the parent or parents as well as the patient. This seems to represent only the tip of the iceberg of what can be done in terms of follow-up.

We can also use telehealth in infertility settings. High-risk patients can benefit, too. Our guidelines say patients with preeclampsia should be seen within 3 days to 1 week. Many are transferred from low-access hospitals to our office. This follow-up, however, also can be done remotely, with patients at health department clinics or even at home. Reporting blood pressure readings and health-related feelings to a physician during a teleconsultation removes driving as a potential inconvenience or obstacle.

Telemedicine can be advantageous in gynecology. Physicians are doing important work with telecolposcopy as a follow-up to abnormal Pap test findings in patients in sub-Saharan Africa.

Routine wound care, which is commonly needed, can be performed in the home by a home health nurse telecommunicating with a physician. I can see broad telehealth use, and indeed our dermatology colleagues have been practicing telemedicine for quite some time.

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