OTN: Linking the Ontario health community since 1998

Telemedicine, the provision of health care by means of telecommunications and information technology, is a reality in Ontario. In the fiscal year 2012-13, more than 300,000 patients received care through telemedicine, a 51% increase over 2011-12. From April 1998, when Ontario’s first telemedicine sites launched at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, Timmins and District, Kirkland and District and the then Lady Minto hospitals, OTN has grown to more than 100 sites across the province. Geography has been eliminated as a barrier for many patients in Ontario. An Introduction to Telemedicine What telemedicine practitioners who have shared their clinical experiences with me helped me realized is that “telemedicine is not a service -...