Yearb Med Inform 2016; 25(01): 41-46
DOI: 10.15265/IY-2016-012
IMIA and Schattauer GmbH
Georg Thieme Verlag KG Stuttgart

Unintended Consequences of Tele Health and their Possible Solutions

Contribution of the IMIA Working Group on Telehealth
S. B. Gogia
1   Society for Administration of Telemedicine and Healthcare Informatics (SATHI), New Delhi, India
,
A. Maeder
2   School of Health Sciences, Flinders University, Bedford Park, Australia
,
M. Mars
3   Dept. of Telehealth, University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa
,
G. Hartvigsen
4   Norwegian Centre for E-health Research & University of Tromso – The Arctic University of Norway, Norway
,
A. Basu
5   School of Health Sciences, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand
,
P. Abbott*
6   School of Nursing, University of Michigan, Michigan, USA
› Author Affiliations
Further Information

Publication History

10 November 2016

Publication Date:
06 March 2018 (online)

Summary

Objectives: Assess unforeseen consequences of Telehealth and suggest solutions

Methods: An outline was created collecting all possible ill effects classified into Clinical considerations, Administrative concerns including interpersonal relations, Technical issues, Legal / Ethical concerns and Miscellaneous. Each topic was assigned to a particular WG member to lead, gather opinion and review existing literature.

Results and Conclusion: A wide array of problems have been described. Except for technical issues, literature on this topic is scant, so this article is based more on personal experience and data collected from surveys. Much can be done to prevent such problems, such as a need for standardization with related clinical studies for devices as well as processes used for telehealth is underlined, besides evaluation of outcomes of projects undertaken.

* We certify that all authors contributed to the creation of this article