A remote medical care system will not only enable patients to receive medical attention without traveling long distances, saving time and money, but also allow hospitals to collect a wide array of patient information through the system, an executive at the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) said yesterday.
At a seminar on remote health care applications and technology standardization, Shau Yio-wha (邵耀華), director of ITRI’s Medical Electronics and Device Technology Center, said that when patients seek medical help in hospital, about 45 percent of their time is spent getting medical checks and waiting for doctors to complete medical records.
However, if patients could send their medical records to hospitals before receiving medical care through a long distance care system, a lot of time can be saved.
Such a system would also help improve outpatient registration accuracy, Shau said.
The value of long distance home medical care not only lies in the costs savings, but in improving the quality of medical care for patients, particularly those with chronic illnesses who need long-term care, Shau said.
Lyn McFarlane, general manager of business operations of UK-based Tunstall, a leading provider of telecare and telehealth solutions, told the seminar that using a remote healthcare system could help boost patients’ self-confidence, increase their peace of mind and promote greater patient self-management.
For example, McFarlane said that Tunstall used a telehealth system to monitor 30 high-risk patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in their own homes in the city of Sheffield in northern England.
Five months later, results showed that telecare in the patients’ homes helped reduce their rate of hospital visits by 50 percent and the number of home visits by medical personnel by 80 percent.
The system was estimated to have saved £1.2 million (US$1.9 million) in medical costs a year for local hospitals, McFarlane said.
Over the past three years, a number of companies in Taiwan have ventured into the telecare arena, but the pace of development of this type of service is still slow, McFarlane said.
She urged Taiwan’s government to pioneer a trial system and conduct related evaluation for the launch of remote medical care services.
GREAT POWER COMPETITION: Beijing views its military cooperation with Russia as a means to push back against the joint power of the US and its allies, an expert said A recent Sino-Russian joint air patrol conducted over the waters off Alaska was designed to counter the US military in the Pacific and demonstrated improved interoperability between Beijing’s and Moscow’s forces, a national security expert said. National Defense University associate professor Chen Yu-chen (陳育正) made the comment in an article published on Wednesday on the Web site of the Journal of the Chinese Communist Studies Institute. China and Russia sent four strategic bombers to patrol the waters of the northern Pacific and Bering Strait near Alaska in late June, one month after the two nations sent a combined flotilla of four warships
‘LEADERS’: The report highlighted C.C. Wei’s management at TSMC, Lisa Su’s decisionmaking at AMD and the ‘rock star’ status of Nvidia’s Huang Time magazine on Thursday announced its list of the 100 most influential people in artificial intelligence (AI), which included Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) chairman and chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家), Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) and AMD chair and CEO Lisa Su (蘇姿丰). The list is divided into four categories: Leaders, Innovators, Shapers and Thinkers. Wei and Huang were named in the Leaders category. Other notable figures in the Leaders category included Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Meta CEO and Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. Su was listed in the Innovators category. Time highlighted Wei’s
EVERYONE’S ISSUE: Kim said that during a visit to Taiwan, she asked what would happen if China attacked, and was told that the global economy would shut down Taiwan is critical to the global economy, and its defense is a “here and now” issue, US Representative Young Kim said during a roundtable talk on Taiwan-US relations on Friday. Kim, who serves on the US House of Representatives’ Foreign Affairs Committee, held a roundtable talk titled “Global Ties, Local Impact: Why Taiwan Matters for California,” at Santiago Canyon College in Orange County, California. “Despite its small size and long distance from us, Taiwan’s cultural and economic importance is felt across our communities,” Kim said during her opening remarks. Stanford University researcher and lecturer Lanhee Chen (陳仁宜), lawyer Lin Ching-chi
Taiwan-Japan Travel Passes are available for use on public transit networks in the two countries, Taoyuan Metro Corp said yesterday, adding that discounts of up to 7 percent are available. Taoyuan Metro, the Taipei MRT and Japan’s Keisei Electric Railway teamed up to develop the pass. Taoyuan Metro operates the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport MRT Line, while Keisei Electric Railway offers express services between Tokyo’s Narita Airport, and the Keisei Ueno and Nippori stations in the Japanese capital, as well as between Narita and Haneda airports. The basic package comprises one one-way ticket on the Taoyuan MRT Line and one Skyliner ticket on
RSS