St. Joseph Health System Expands Access to Care with New Telehealth Project with AT&T
Posted on Feb 22, 2011 By St. Joseph Health System
ORANGE, CA, February 22, 2011 — St. Joseph Health (SJH), a $4.6 billion Catholic healthcare organization and
AT&T* today announced an agreement with plans to implement a new telehealth pilot project that will allow patients and physicians in disparate locations to meet and consult via immersive video utilizing
AT&T Telepresence Solution®.
Under this collaboration, St. Joseph Health will have seven interactive wellness stations that will help improve access to specialty care, urgent care, wellness and health improvement services. This new pilot will be rolled out in the next several months in various Southern California locations including physician and patient sites.
The wellness stations will include a fully managed AT&T Telepresence Solution comprised of components including Cisco HealthPresence®, connectivity to the AT&T Business Exchange and AMD Global Telemedicine medical peripherals. This project will allow physicians and other health and wellness specialists to connect with patients virtually using the AT&T global network and real time, immersive multi-point video and audio technologies.
The focus of this pilot is to address the needs of patients who experience financial, social, geographic and other barriers to care.
“As a Catholic health care system, it is our goal to extend beyond our hospital walls to provide better access to care particularly specialty care where it hasn’t been as accessible before,” states Elliot Sternberg, M.D., Executive Vice President of Wellness and Health Improvement at St. Joseph Health.
The program involves physical modular units equipped with the telepresence hardware and software that will be stationed at the various locations. Patients and care providers will conduct virtual visits with each other from these units.
Five initial sites have been selected by SJH: Occupational Health Services at St. Jude Heritage Medical Group in Fullerton, Camino Health Clinic in San Juan Capistrano, St. Jude Neighborhood Clinic in Fullerton, Mission Hospital in Laguna Beach and a standalone kiosk in Rancho Cucamonga. Two additional sites are expected to be selected by year-end.