So, how can the RTC enhance health care? One of the driving influences to the use of advanced technologies by rural communities is the technology's ability to enhance access to health care services. Many of the technologies within the RTC will assist the ability of local health care providers to provide preventative health care services and supplement services with access to needed expertise. The RTC's imaging warehouse will support the development of community and regional health information networks so that providers can share integrated, multimedia information about the care of a patient and to enhance the information used to assess the general health of a community. Interactive teleconferencing will encourage access to needed expertise and the ability to reduce the isolation of patients and health care professionals. New health care services can be provided in a cost-effective manner that increase patient education and improve the patient's access to a more seamless continuum of care.
Managed Care Systems (Health Maintenance Organizations) are built on the principal of keeping people healthy (promoting healthy behaviors), preventing illness, treating illness in the most timely cost-effective setting, and then maintaining the highest level of health for its members. To reach this goal will require access to health promotion and disease prevention services and an integrated seamless medical care delivery system. Advanced telecommunications and technology are the tools to facilitate the needed individual, community and regional connectivity to achieve a truly seamless integrated health care delivery system.
The RTC is an opportunity to bring affordable advanced telecommunication and technology to your community to extend health care services out to surrounding communities and communities around the world or to supplement local expertise with experience from around the world.