In the first panel dedicated to Telehealth and Telemedicine of the RNP 2014 Forum, the concern in extending the assistance to the population was latent. 

For the Brazil Networks National Telehealth Program Coordinator Tâmara Guedes, there are bottlenecks in the basic care that can be minimized with telehealth. As examples of problems, she cited the insufficient supply of some specialties, the difficulty of resources for transportation to the service, unnecessary referrals that could be solved by the basic care and the lack of integration among the health care network.

“Today, the Brazil Networks Telehealth Program is found in 11 states. We have been discussing with the Ministry of Health how to expand this service to other locations. We have 42 deployed telehealth cores and 20 ones being deployed. The challenge now is to change the culture and promote digital inclusion of health professionals, in addition to expanding the program to all municipalities and make the link with priority programs,” she said.

The engineer of the Process Management and Information Technology Board of Brazilian Hospital Services Company (EBSERH) Jônatas Mattes showed initiatives that should be developed at university hospitals to improve IT infrastructure, improving the care of the population in a non-invasive way, i.e., without harming the patient care.  

“At the UHs, we aim at recovering 15 years of lack of prioritization of IT in hospitals over the next three years. During this period, we seek to start the datacenter project and take care of the direct care of the user. In the data center, we have the solution of a standardized safe room, which has rapid deployment, high durability, non-intrusive way, i.e., it does not affect patient care. In addition to that, we intend to deploy 4K telemedicine cores by the end of 2014, promoting the SIGs (Special Interest Groups) and strengthening telehealth. Our vision for the future of IT is to head down to a path where it is automatic,” he explained.

In his lecture, the doctor of the Albert Einstein Israelite Hospital and the University of São Paulo (USP) Medical School Edson Amaro Júnior said that the focus was on the elderly population. “The growth is part of the life cycle and brings diseases. Therefore, it is important to think of actions to include the elderly and debilitated population, promoting and monitoring the health of the elderly, with information processing and support to the medical area,” reported the expert, who supported that the IT challenge in the Health area is to process complex data, such as examinations in increasingly precise images. 

“We can have access to the interoperability of machines for processing data from a long distance. We need to train people and also have interfaces related to the limitation of the elderly,” he added.

The Datasus Director Augusto Cesar Gadelha Vieira, presented the National Policy for Informatics and Health Information, highlighting the need to improve work processes in Health. “This policy provides the innovative, creative, and transforming use of IT to improve the care of the population’s health”, he said.  

Rute exceeds the mark of 100 cores

At the end of the session, the Telemedicine University Network (Rute), National Coordinator Luiz Ary Messina announced the opening of five new units - two in São Paulo, at the German Hospital Oswaldo Cruz (HAOC) and at the Hospital Center of Santo André; one in Recife, at the Agamenon Magalhães Hospital (HAM); one in Salvador, at Ana Nery Hospital (HAN), and one in Belem, at the Sanda Casa de Misericórdia Foundation of Pará. With the 97 existing ones, the new telemedicine units will exceed the mark of 100 Rute units created, approved, and operating throughout Brazil.

On occasion, Messina also distributed to the audience the second Rute book, which will be available in pdf on the initiative's website.