Akron Children's Hospital in Ohio is using telemedicine to connect to two schools for mentally and physically disabled children to prevent students from having to leave school for medical examinations, the Akron Beacon Journal reports.
The program, called Tele-Health-Kids, allows sick students at Ida Sue School in Wooster, Ohio, and Dale Roy School in Ashland, Ohio, to receive care remotely. School nurses check students using specialized devices and then send participating pediatricians digital pictures and audio via a computer.
Pediatricians from the Cleveland Clinic Family Health Center, Children's Hospital Physician Associates and Pediatric Consultants then view the data and, if necessary, conduct live examinations online using computerized video cameras in the pediatric practices and the schools.
The project has been used on a limited basis in the summer session this month at Ida Sue School and will be fully operational at both schools when regular sessions begin this fall, the Beacon Journal reports.
The Office for the Advancement of Telehealth within the Health Resources and Services Administration awarded Akron Children's Hospital a three-year, $750,000 grant to fund the project. Part of the federal grant also will be used to reimburse physicians $50 per appointment, but the goal is eventually to persuade insurers to pay for the telemedicine visits, Diane Langkamp, medical director of the program, said. The hospital is contributing $79,000 to the project (Powell, Akron Beacon Journal, 7/27).