Veterans in remote areas get care via telemedicine

Many veterans who have limited mobility and live in rural areas far from a doctor or hospital are getting the medical attention they need through telemedicine, in which medical information is exchanged electronically, allowing patients and doctors to interact, sometimes thousands of miles apart, reports Quil Lawrence for NPR. (NPR photo by David Gilkey: Octavia Wilson does telemedicine in Wales, Alaska.)

The program saves time, money and need for travel, Lawrence reports. For example, a doctor in Anchorage was able to show a patient's skin lesion to a dermatologist in Seattle, who ordered an immediate biopsy. The patient turned out to have melanoma, and within three weeks had surgery and it was fully excised. Without telemedicine, the procedure would have taken much longer, would have cost much more, and would have probably resulted in a plane trip.

"The VA estimates it has saved more than 800,000 miles of travel that patients didn't have to make since the program was set up," reports Lawrence. And it makes it easier for patients, such as one in a remote area of Alaska, who has a machine at home that takes his blood pressure every day and can beam the information directly to the VA. (Read more)