¶ … profession of telemedicine finds itself being pursued with vigor given the widely believed perception that one of the main advantages it offers is that of cost savings in the field of healthcare. These economical considerations may appear in both forms- tangible as well as intangible. Telemedicine, however, is also an outcome of the lesser number of healthcare professionals in proportion to the rise in number of patients. The other factor that has contributed in actualization of telemedicine is the rise of ICT sector and ease of communication over the distance (McLean et al., 2013). One aspect of Telemedicine that appears immediately is whether it is safe, given the general feeling of trust one encounters when meeting one's physician and his reassuring tone. In this regard, one well-researched article in Sweden notes that after decades of resorting to Telemedicine, one realizes that the parameter of safety revolves around the ambient social environment, the management ethos of the telenursing organization, the patient himself and the nurse/doctor attending to the call. As such much needs to be done in this sector (Marta Roing, 2013).

All these developments have converged to make telemedicine practice an acceptable solution to the general Evidence Based therapies and diagnoses. We aim to evaluate the article in the light of these parameters. This paper focuses on analyzing the article 'The Impact of Telehealthcare on the Quality and Safety of Care: A Systematic Overview' (McLean et al., 2013). We have chosen this article for analysis as it professes to scrutinize the facts of claims laid by those adapting it in the light of economic considerations, the benefits and the risks involved in telemedicine.

Analysis

The Study

In its introduction itself, the authors have declared that it is high time we analyzed critically the costs, benefits and risks involved in practicing Telemedicine. Towards this effort they have reviewed articles in various acclaimed journals and periodicals like the PakMed, IndMed, MEDLINE, The Cochrane Library, LILACS and EMBASE. The authors have done a comprehensive job in analyzing as many as 1,782 articles published in the period January1997 through November 2011.

The article follows the directions of the CASP (Critical Appraisal Skills Programme) in its pursuit and can hence be depended upon for academic authenticity. The article incorporates review of articles...

The synchronous one is in which the telemedicine Healthcare professional interacts with the patient in a one-on-one mode to offer solutions for relief. The asynchronous interactions are the ones that use ICT to store medical data and forward them on request or need to help medical assistance.
Inferences and Limitations

One of the conclusions drawn in the study is that most studies agree that there is no qualitative difference in the services and consequential outcomes between real time bed-side healthcare services and those given by long-distance telemedicine professionals. That seems to imply that Telemedicine can replace to a large degree the conventional real time nursing and medical services. However, in the conclusion the article itself refutes the claim partially in cautioning the policy makers that investment in Telemedicine does not necessarily transform into monetary or clinical advantages. Such a posit needs to be revisited because the article has considered certain articles with as few as twenty (20) respondents (McLean et al., 2013).

Another important parameter is that of reduced hospitalization instantiations or revisits to the hospital for follow-up advices. This factor is amongst the main aims of Telemedicine gaining importance as an alternative to patients who find it difficult to travel to hospitals repeatedly. The article observes that many of the studies it reviewed supported this claim. This claim is open to questions of economic costs involved and constraints like mobility, time, occupational hazards, availability of assigned doctors and quality of services. An important point of safety of patients arises from the same concerns. In fact, these two points - that of accessibility and the reliability of telemedicine do converge to invite attention from researchers.

The outcomes in clinical domain have not been established even though in some cases that the article reviewed, the systolic and diastolic measures of Blood Pressure improved and stabilized significantly. The patients were however monitored for short durations (less than 12 months).

In the field of coronary diseases where most emergency attention is required, combination of tele-monitoring and store-and-forward methodologies has been realized to be quite effective, though not conclusively in favor of Telemedicine, though some changes in the way the…