GLWACH Tele-Critical Care Summit discusses way forward

By Mr. John Brooks (Army Medicine)August 8, 2016

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(Photo Credit: U.S. Army) VIEW ORIGINAL

FORT LEONARD WOOD, Mo. -- The Department of Defense's first and longest continuously active Tele-Critical Care pilot program at General Leonard Wood Army Community Hospital brought 40 joint-service participants here June 3 to discuss next steps in DOD Tele-Critical Care.

GLWACH Commander, COL Peter Nielsen, undertook plans to host the joint summit here at Fort Leonard Wood as a result of multi-service telehealth leaders' interest in GLWACH's telehealth pilot program.

Army, Navy, Air Force and Veteran Affairs (VA) telehealth leaders all shared their current tele-critical care program status, capability and future development objectives at the summit.

"It was clear that, although unique service needs and approaches were different, every service shared a remarkable appreciation for telehealth care and that each is trying to leverage its potential to improve access to safer, higher-quality care," said John Ingersoll, GLWACH's chief of Clinical Operations.

One cornerstone of the summit was the key note presentation by University of Massachusetts professor, Dr. Craig Lilly. A seasoned critical care provider of 22 years and current TCC medical director, Dr. Lilly provided unique insights on development of an enterprise-wide critical care system built around improving clinical situational awareness through common operating protocols, Ingersoll said.

Another highlight and honor was the strong attendance by VA partners who shared some incredible efforts to improve critical care through telehealth. Two VA networks, VISN 23 and VISN 10, have developed robust TCC hubs and actively distribute care to hundreds of VA beds throughout the country which consistently brings the highest-quality critical care to veterans' bedsides within seconds. These efforts have greatly facilitated the VA's ability to provide higher care to veterans, closer to home than ever before, Ingersoll said.

The VA's VISN 23 is actively exploring partnership with the U.S. Air Force to provide tele-critical care. The VA has active communications with all services directed toward sharing expertise and developing solutions.

"It was fantastic to meet all these telehealth leaders; to better understand their service's efforts in bringing the highest quality care to the patients' bedside," said Col. Peter Nielsen, GLWACH commander and Summit host. "Telehealth is obviously shaping new relationships and partnerships that seek to add value in the military-to-Veteran health care service chain. This summit has fostered relationships which will continue to innovate and enhance sharing, and render more value-added solutions as we march forward to harness technology. There are clearly more wins in a future of working together; telehealth greatly enhances our joint ability to bring expertise to the fixed patient bedside and also furthers DODs ability to provide higher quality prolonged field care."