"Physical therapy is not a subspecialty of the medical profession and physical therapists are not medical doctors; we are a separate profession that provides a unique service that physicians are unable and untrained to provide."

Letter to the AMA from the APTA, Dec 2009

Saturday, April 23, 2011

A Physical Therapist at the American Telemedicine Association's Annual conference

The American Telemedicine Association (ATA) is coming to the Tampa Convention Center here in Florida on May 1st to 3rd, 2011.

The ATA 16th Annual International Meeting and Exposition is the world's largest focusing exclusively on telemedicine and health.

I will attend the meeting representing PhysicalTherapyDiagnosis.com and I will interview several important people in the telemedicine industry. Among the luminaries I've already scheduled:
  • Jean Bisio, President of Humana Cares, will present Emerging Markets in Federal Telehealth from 4:15 - 5:15 p.m. on Tuesday, May 3rd and I plan to attend this event - booth #1117.

  • Jay Culver will demonstrate the Total Exam Camera by GlobalMedia - booth #717.

  • IDEAL LIFE, the industry leader in remote health management solutions - booth # 1617.

  • MD2GO, Sony's remote HD IP camera system, is designed to enable HD Video communication between a healthcare professional and a patient - booth #416

  • Louis Burns, CEO of Care Innovations, is participating in the Emerging Markets for Remote Monitoring Applications roundtable on Monday, May 2, from 1-2pm in the Plenary Ballroom C.

  • Alice Borrelli, Director of Global Health and Workforce Policy for Intel, is participating in the Transitioning Successful Pilot Studies into Mainstream Applications roundtable on Monday, May 2, from 3-4pm in the Plenary Ballroom C.

  • Intel-GE Care Innovations™ has its blog set up so you can see some of the innovative, new telemedicine devices available this year.
I encourage physical therapists, especially private practice therapists and those in a position to lead their healthcare organizations, to learn about and perhaps embrace these technological changes - not for the sake of either change or for technology - but because of the promise that they bring to make better our patients lives.

3 comments:

  1. Really like your participation here. I've attempted to begin tele-health PT/OT evaluations here in rural Colorado (i.e. a PTA is on-site, and the PT does the "eval" via skype or the like). However, our Colorado practice act is saying that this is not allowed as there is "no position" on it yet.
    Do you see a national position coming out on this anytime soon? It would really allow improved access in rural areas... Thanks- Tyler Keeter PT, DPT, MHA

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi Tyler,

    You can contact Alan Lee, DPT, an Associate Professor at Mount St. Mary's College in the
    Doctor of Physical Therapy Program in Los Angeles at allee@msmc.la.edu.

    He in involved in California and the whole West Coast telemedicine effort - including licensing across state lines.

    I know the Board of PT here in Florida is dipping their toes warily into telemedicine because the ability to treat patients in states where you are not licensed renders the powers of the Board, to use their words, "moot".

    Thank you for commenting,

    Tim

    ReplyDelete
  3. Great Article about the future of medicine. Telemedicine will allow the most distant places have a great health care. Soldiers, oil rigs workers, delegations, ambassadors and businessmen in all the corners of the world can use American best medicine through the technology advanced telemedicine equipment.

    ReplyDelete

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Tim Richardson, PT owns a private practice at Medical Arts Rehabilitation, Inc in Palmetto, Florida. The clinic website is at MedicalArtsRehab.com.

Bulletproof Expert Systems: Clinical Decision Support for Physical Therapists in the Outpatient Setting is a manager's workbook with stories, checklists, charts, graphs, tables, and templates describing how you can use paper-based or computerized tools to improve your clinic's Medicare compliance, process adherence and patient outcomes.

Tim has implemented a computerized Clinical Decision Support (CDS) system in his clinic since 2006 that serves as a Reminder, Alerting, Prompting and Predicting CDS using evidence-based tests and measures.

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