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Technology links patients with physicians

Reprinted with permission from The Messenger
by: Lori Harrison, staff writer

Regional Medical Center’s new rolling robot doesn’t have a doctor’s lab coat, but that may be coming.

The robot saw its first patient Monday morning.

The high-tech device is part of UofL Health Care’s remote physician presence robot network, which links western Kentucky patients with specialists through a wireless Internet link.

“We have the opportunity here to interact more effectively by consultation,” said Dr. Kerri Remmel, stroke neurologist and chairwoman of the university’s department of neurology.

She spoke from Louisville — appearing on the robot’s video screen “head” — to Trover Health System medical staff, residents and other employees during a Monday lunch meeting at RMC.

“I do want you to know I have the ability to see everyone in the room,” she said.

“What this allows me to do is roll right into the room and up to the patient in the bed,” Remmel said. “I can actually look at the pupil area light reaction.”

Via the robot, physicians can study CT scans and patient monitors, listen to heart sounds with the help of a nurse, and talk with family members.

For the past seven years, Remmel has consulted with emergency room physicians and neurologists over the telephone about care of stroke patients. Medical personnel were looking for a better way to do this.

With the robot, officials think they’ve found it.

So far, seven western Kentucky hospitals are participating in the program, said Eugene Gilchrist, associate vice president for health affairs and CEO for University Physicians Associates. Two hundred of the InTouch Health robots are in operation across the country.

UofL Health Care covers the cost of leasing the robots, and the consulting UofL physicians will bill patients for their services.

Initially, RMC plans to use the service for stroke patients, said Trover Health System CEO and President Bert Whitaker.

“It is absolutely imperative for us to continue to be innovative, to provide care for people who might not otherwise have access,” Whitaker said. “It’s also important to continue continuity of care for our patients. In an area like ours, it is sometimes a real challenge to recruit and retain the specialists we need.”

The goal of the program is not to refer patients out of the region, he said, but to better determine which ones need to go elsewhere for care.

Whitaker asked Trover doctors to consider other ways the robot may be used.

The robot will be housed in the emergency department.

“We’re really excited about the neurological piece of this, but also the other services,” said Dr. Mark Browne, vice president of medical affairs. “I think this is a great opportunity.”

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