5,000 patients benefit from NCRHA tele-medicine programme

Over 5,000 patients have benefitted from the North Central Regional Health’s (NCRHA) tele-medicine programme within the last five weeks.

In a release by the RHA, through frequent interaction, patients have been able to receive continued medical assistance and support, have their prescriptions renewed, pre-packages and arranged for pick-up.

CEO Davlin Thomas said there had been a reduction in healthcare cost, more convenient and accessible patient care, extended specialist and referring physician access and increased patient engagement.

He said “This, consequently, has been beneficial to patients as they are now experiencing more personalised quality care, are at reduced risk of contracting covid19, incur less costs with transportation, require less time away from work and are afforded regular interaction with primary care physicians and reviews from doctors without the challenges of coming in to the health care facility. The future of the tele-medicine programme looks extremely bright, especially given its recent successes.

“It is expected that further progress and development will take place in the way we engage the provision of health care in the coming months, and the years going forward.”

Telemedicine was introduced by the RHA in March this year as a pilot project with the Chronic Disease clinics. In the early stage of the pilot project doctors were required to call and interact with uncontrolled diabetes, hypertension and heart disease patients ahead of their clinic appointment.

The project is focused on providing premium service to high-risk patients in the3 face of the covid19 pandemic.

Thomas also praised the commitment and dedication of staff to prevent any interruption of this new service.

Dr Keisha Gangaram, primary care physician II, at the Arima Health Facility said has drastically reduced the risk of covid19 infection among patients with pre-existing conditions.

She said, “On one hand, we could not risk exposing our more susceptible groups, but on the other hand, we had to ensure that they continued to receive the quality level of care and service required as they normally do. The introduction of the Tele-medicine programme has allowed for us to not only to do that but also to do it with great success, as a lot of the testimonials have shown.”