The Arizona Telemedicine Program Blog

Show Low is a city of about 11,000 in the White Mountains of northeastern Arizona, a summer vacation haven. The city got its name after a high-stakes poker game in which one of the players met the other’s challenge to “show low” with a deuce of clubs. The winner’s take was a 100,000-acre ranch. The game is said to have been played by “early settlers” of the city, which was founded in 1870.

But Show Low is becoming better known today for its Summit Healthcare Regional Medical Center, an 89-bed hospital serving a 3,300 square mile area. Services offered include a level-two nursery; cardiac care; home health care; general, vascular and plastic surgery; a cancer center that offers radiation and medical oncology; and wound care and hyperbaric center.

Did you know that telestroke isn’t solely about determining whether a patient is having an ischemic stroke and needs a clot-busting drug? Or that telepsychiatrists feel that establishing a doctor-patient relationship via telemedicine (never meeting their patients in person) works well? Or that Arizona law requires informed consent before a patient can receive healthcare services through telemedicine?

These are just a few things participants learned at the daylong “Arizona Telemedicine Course: Applications, Model Programs, and Secrets for Success,” held October 9, 2015 at Flagstaff Medical Center.

I am an assistant professor at the University of Arizona, College of Nursing, a full-time position that includes research in my chosen field of health care systems and informatics, in which I have a PhD.

I also work one day a week as a hospice nurse, providing palliative care, which is focused on comfort and quality of life for patients nearing the end of life.

The “hands-on” care that is the hallmark of palliative care is often perceived to be in opposition to the “hi-tech” world of informatics. My recent experiences have shown that’s not the case.

Each weekday morning at 20 Tucson elementary schools, more than 260 children with asthma report to their school nurse or health aid. Each child is given their own corticosteroid inhaler, inhales the medication, then returns to class.

The children are part of a multi-year, NIH-funded study of an asthma prevention program that is school-based for a number of reasons. The study was launched in the fall of 2014 in 20 schools in the Tucson Unified School District (TUSD).

Need a doctor? Just use your tablet to see one via video—your insurance company may even pay for it. Or go to your nearest pharmacy—or maybe a kiosk at your workplace—for a telemedicine visit. This new service model is much more convenient, faster and cheaper than heading to an emergency department or urgent care center, and it’s growing by leaps and bounds.