OTN
![]() | In my previous post I reviewed some of the ways Telemedicine is being used across the province to support care of the elderly. In this post I’ll review findings from articles that explore the use and benefits of telemedicine in geriatrics.
A recent article published by Baycrest, compares a face-to-face session versus a telemedicine session for clinic-based group cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) with adults who suffer from depression and anxiety. The results of which show that group CBT can be delivered in a technology... |
There are some incredible innovators and leaders among Ontario’s healthcare community who have advanced the use of telemedicine in the province. We wanted to take a moment to give them some well-deserved recognition.
The Champions of Telemedicine Award was established to celebrate the outstanding contributions of these leaders within each of the 14 Ontario LHINs, and a leader within Ontario’s aboriginal community. OTN’s front-line staff and community partners nominated individuals for this award, and then Champions were selected based on their achievements in the following areas:
Demonstrates leadership among peers and inspires the adoption of telemedicine in their practice, hospital, program or community to help... | |
![]() | The rate of change in the digital world is nothing short of dazzling. The way we work, communicate and collaborate continues to evolve with new services and applications being introduced every day.
So it gives me great pleasure to announce the launch of the OTNhub, the new one-stop telemedicine service that delivers enhanced convenience and functionality to Ontario’s healthcare providers.
When the integration of OTN services is fully completed in the near future, the OTNhub will allow Primary Care Providers, Specialty Care Providers (specialists and allied health providers) and Healthcare Organizations to access all services relevant to them with a single sign-in. From... |
What do playing Monopoly, driving a car, and baking cupcakes have in common? They all have rules to be followed. Generally, rules aim to ensure fairness, protect from harm, and instruct on how best to do something.
As a regulatory body, the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (CPSO) maintains a set of rules, in the form of policies, to guide physicians on how best to provide patient care. The CPSO revises these polices from time to time, with input from key stakeholders. This past July and August, the CPSO held a public consultation on draft revisions to its Telemedicine policy.
Given our extensive expertise in telemedicine, OTN submitted a response to this where we proposed changes to the Telemedicine policy that will help... | |
The future of virtual care is mHealth – incorporating mobile devices into the delivery of virtual services. Recently, I wrote about how OTN is offering Personal Videoconferencing on a personal computer, so you don’t need to go to a room-based studio with a codec and a camera. Instead, you can download software onto a personal computer, and conduct the consultation over that device via the internet with other endpoints, whether it’s a Personal Videoconferencing device or a room-based studio. Eventually this functionality will be extended to any mobile device – tablet or... | |
Ontario’s newest innovation in virtual care continues OTN’s leadership in the field. Finally, technology has been developed that facilitates care delivery through the Internet, on PCs or laptops, with sharp clear images and little transmission delay.
OTN CEO Dr. Ed Brown on Personal Video Conferencing.
Sign up for Personal Videoconferencing.
Any member of the Ontario healthcare community can apply to use OTN’s Personal Videoconferencing service. Specialists, whose expertise may be unavailable in communities across Ontario, can now provide care in real-time from their home or office, thereby extending the reach of their practice. Travel time for the consultant... | |
OTN was established in 1997 with the vision that telemedicine will be a mainstream channel for healthcare delivery and education. There were several barriers initially including startup costs, a compelling business case, a process for scheduling events, paying doctors, and overcoming health care professionals’ (HCP) resistance to using the technologies. A business and operational strategy was developed, always keeping in mind the need to be as easy and convenient to use as face-to-face encounters.
OTN currently has four channels of virtual care:
Elective Virtual Ambulatory Care: Last year OTN supported over 300,000 provider/patient real-time video consultations in over 40 specialty services. The top 5 therapeutic... | |
Telehomecare is focused on supporting patients with long-term chronic diseases. As our population ages, more and more people are living with chronic diseases, which means they’ll be seeing physicians more and going to the hospital more. This results in higher costs for the healthcare system. So the healthcare system is looking for ways of supporting these people to live optimally with their chronic disease, and to minimize the need for them to engage with the healthcare system. The Telehomecare program is a way of helping people understand their illness better, and to self-manage their chronic disease without the need for interacting with the healthcare system.
A Telehomecare... | |
Many small communities throughout Ontario don’t have a local psychiatrist, so it can be challenging at times for people in these communities to receive psychiatric services. Telepsychiatry gives people in these communities the opportunity to interact one-on-one with a psychiatrist from another part of the province. Moreover, people with mobility issues need only to travel to a local Telehealth studio, rather than to a psychiatrist’s office.
We’ve had very positive reactions from people that have participated in one-to-one psychiatric patient videos. The patients feel very comfortable – in fact, we’ve had some patients tell us they’re... | |
OTN is an independent, not-for-profit
organization funded by the
Government of Ontario.