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March 21, 2013

Pediatric telemedicine project launched

The Schools of the Health Sciences have launched “Optimizing Utilization and Rural Emergency Access for Children” or OUTREACH, a project to make telemedicine more effective in pediatric emergencies.

Jeremy Kahn, project leader and faculty member in critical care medicine and health policy at Pitt’s School of Medicine and Graduate School of Public Health, explained: “About a quarter of all pediatric emergency visits are to hospitals in rural areas, yet these hospitals rarely possess the equipment, experience and expertise necessary to provide effective emergency care to children. Our goal is to make it quick and easy for rural emergency doctors to consult with pediatric specialists at UPMC to determine the best treatment plan for each child.”

The project is being paid for with a nearly $1 million grant from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Health Resources and Services Administration. It is designed to address the critical deficiencies in pediatric emergency care reported in the Institute of Medicine’s “Emergency Care for Children: Growing Pains.”

Kahn and his team will interview hospital administrators, physicians, nurses, emergency transport personnel, patients and families to identify issues surrounding pediatric emergency care and potential obstacles to using telemedicine in rural hospitals.

That information then will be used to craft a standardized educational program to help these hospitals best use telemedicine to improve pediatric emergency care through consultations with Children’s Hospital specialists. The team will partner with the Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare, which oversees the state’s Medicaid program, to evaluate the effects of the program.

“There is an inherent value in keeping a sick or injured child in his or her community when possible,” Kahn said. “They can recover with their family and friends close by and avoid excessive disruption to their family’s routine.”

In the last year, more than 400 children were transferred from a rural emergency department to Children’s Hospital — a journey that can involve several hours of travel time — only to be discharged immediately back to their communities.

If these children had been triaged via telemedicine, $800,000 could have been saved, according to data collected from the Children’s Hospital emergency department.

Initially, the OUTREACH program will be in five rural hospitals: UPMC Northwest Hospital, Venango County; UPMC Horizon Hospital, Mercer County; Washington Hospital, Washington County; Armstrong County Memorial Hospital, Armstrong County, and DuBois Regional Medical Center, Clearfield County.

More hospitals will be recruited as the project progresses.


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