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Augmenting Rural Healthcare
Diana Carrau MD, Ernest Manders MD, Karen Alexander PhD
The Ohio Statue University
2020-02-15
Presenter: Diana Carrau MD
Affidavit:
Diana has been involved in the design, process, and implementation of this unique study to improve access to care in rural communities.
Director Name: Gregory Pearson MD
Author Category: Resident Plastic Surgery
Presentation Category: Clinical
Abstract Category: General Reconstruction
The scarcity of resources in rural areas poses a challenge to providing efficient healthcare. Coos Bay, Oregon provides healthcare to 120,000 over 200 miles of coastline. Lack of access to primary care results in increased ambulance transport, emergency room visits, and readmissions, driving up healthcare costs for patients and providers. The Augmenting Rural Healthcare project expands upon telemedicine, which has been shown to improve outcomes and is widely approved for reimbursement, by making use of augmented reality technology to provide high-quality healthcare at lower costs through improved resource utilization and efficiency. We aligned with key stakeholders, including an intermediate care clinic, a paramedic program, a hospital, a rehabilitation center, and a fire department to deploy and study the use of Mira Prism augmented reality headsets on the front lines of healthcare. The headsets connect providers in the field with physicians who can facilitate and direct care in real time at the first point of contact with the patient. The headset technology allows the provider wearing it to capture the patient encounter in a hands-free manner and share it with a remote expert physician on the receiving end through a computer-based application. The remote expert can then direct care through annotation, text, additional imagery, and verbal instruction. This is an ongoing project, initiated early January 2020. Quantitative and qualitative healthcare outcomes, as well as cost savings, will be measured. We share our experiences regarding the process and implementation of augmented reality technology in a rural community and preliminary results.
