Primary Care
Family Health Teams (FHTs) bring professionals together to organize care in new ways and to complement each others’ skills. The Ontario Telemedicine Network is helping to take that care one step further by introducing telemedicine to FHTs and their care delivery partners. Together, they will create local and regional ‘webs of care’, enabled by telemedicine.
OTN’s Primary Care project will provide telemedicine services to 70 Family Health Teams and their key partners.
How It Works
Connecting via OTN is similar to arranging a face-to-face consultation, only the consultation take place by videoconference. The patient needn’t travel farther than the Family Health Team office to connect with specialists and other health care professionals.
OTN technology also connects clinicians in different locations for educational events and administrative meetings.
The Benefits
- Increased and more timely access to specialists and other clinicians for patient consultations and care
- Improved access to, and sharing of, scarce health human resources across FHTs (such as Nurse practitioners, Social Workers, Registered Dietitians, Diabetic Educators and other clinicians)
- Enhanced linkages to providers from different disciplines and settings for improved collaboration and coordination of quality patient care
- Sharing of best practices for clinical, educational and operational practices
- Better and more timely access to patient education, as well as professional and continuing education
For more information about OTN’s Primary Care project, please call 1-866-454-OTN5 or email primarycare@otn.ca