Telemed quick hits: Of course it was in the federal stimulus bill; Planned Parenthoods in CA/UT up next; On guard MN
Specific telemedicine spending in final stimulus bill: The recently passed $787 billion economic stimulation bill includes $19 billion for health information technology. Specific for telemedicine, it will provide… $1.5 billion for HRSA [Health Resources and Services Administration] to use to build or repair health centers and/or to purchase equipment, and $85 million for health IT and telehealth technologies within the Indian Health Service. In addition ot this, much of the other HIT money will most likely have telehealth applications….
… The [Association for Utah Community Health] Telehealth Program will… supply[ ] telehealth equipment and resources to all association members….
Members of theAUCH include… Planned Parenthood of UT, a Title X funded reproductive health organization….
Services to be provided include… videoconferencing….
Specific PP participants of the UT Telehealth Network include clinics located in Logan, Ogden, Park City, Salt Lake, South Jordan, St. George, UT Valley, and West Valley.
A couple telemedicine funds are mentioned. 9 CA PPs are listed as “community clinics”: PP Golden Gate, PP Shasta Diablo, PP Los Angeles, PP Mar Monte, PP Pasadena and San Gabriel Valley, Six Rivers PP, PP of OCSB, PP of San Diego & Riverside Counties, and PP of Santa Barbara, Ventura and San Luis Obispo Counties.
We continue to explore innovative ways to deliver medical services and enhance the overall experience of our patients, including telemedicine….
It’s 2009 Rural Women’s Health Report is chock full of telemed buzz phrases. Following is a snippet. On guard, MN pro-lifers:
The obstacles faced by health care providers and patients in rural areas are vastly different from those in urban areas. Economic factors… and the isolation of living in remote areas all impact rural residents’ ability to lead a healthy life.
Jill Stanek is a nurse turned speaker, columnist and blogger, a national figure in the effort to protect both preborn and postborn innocent human life.
Telemed is supposed to represent the future of medicine in our country, translating into millions of dollars saved. The first rollouts of Telemed has people dealing with domestic based health care providers. But what would there be to stop medical care providers from acting like software giants who offshore technical support? Instead of dealing with a local practitioner maybe we will be dealing with someone in India.
Certainly the quality of health care will suffer if the physician is not able to see and assess the condition of a patient face to face. But then again the organization we see pushing Telemed does not think holistically about their clients.
Planned Parenthood thinks rather in mechanistic terms about their clients–what percentage got what services at what cost. If a woman has complications following an abortion (or an RU 486 dose) at a PP facility they are told not to return to them but to go to their doctor or to an emergency room.
Furthermore, PP is unable to provide an objective consultation to their clients with regards to all of the factors associated with some of their services because they choose to ignore science. Things which should be mentioned–i.e. the increased risks of future complications following abortions and other downside effects of chemicals used to prevent or terminate pregnacies–if mentioned at all they are treated as though the risks are very, very small. And yet, as we know, hundreds of women have died following abortions in “safe” facilities and countless others have suffered and/or died from the use of powerful chemical interventions.
Planned Parenthood is built upon lies, and as we saw in the Lila Rose videos those lies continue to this day. Now they are spreading their tenacles and lies into rural communities via Telemed.