This document provides details of the Global Hospital Project being undertaken by the Foundation.
Contents
The quantity and quality of medical and health-related information available on the Internet today is staggering. In addition, the number of medical and health professionals that are actively participating in online discussions and providing support to their colleagues is growing at an exponential rate.
This wealth of information and support provides an opportunity for Internet-based telemedicine that will support, and complement, existing and planned telemedicine projects utilising more advanced communications and computing technologies. Indeed, the Internet provides an excellent opportunity to test telemedicine concepts quickly and cost-effectively.
The Internet offers an opportunity for low cost, effective implementation of improved healthcare provision, through the availability of medical knowledge, expertise and support to medical and health professionals. The phenomena of online support groups, consisting of individuals nursing friends and relatives suffering from particular illnesses or disabilities, supported by medically trained professionals also provides an opportunity for cost-effective support that can complement existing social services.
Awareness of these opportunities remains low. Only 10% of the worlds hospitals currently use the Internet to improve the quality and cost-effectiveness of their services.
Health On the Net Foundation, a non-profit organisation based in Geneva, Switzerland, is seeking to address this situation through the Global Hospital Project. With the support of commercial and non-commercial organisations, the project will help these hospitals to implement Internet access and provide limited operational support through education and communications programs that highlight the value of the Internet to hospitals worldwide.
The Global Hospital Project has genuinely global objectives. Hospitals in developing and more developed countries can benefit alike from the Internet. Furthermore, each has a contribution to make to the development of the Internet and to professional colleagues around the world.
Research undertaken by the National Library of Medicine in the USA has demonstrated that a high proportion (90%) of US hospitals with a medical library and employing a professional librarian have already established Internet access but only 20% of hospitals with a medical library and no professional librarian have Internet access. This demonstrates the opportunity that exists in one of the more developed countries.
The Global Hospital Project will bring 500 hospitals from every region of the world onto the
Internet through education, communications and support programs. The Project will also educate
health and medical professionals on the effective use of the Internet to support them in their work
and of the resources that exist on it.
2.1 Primary Goals:
2.2 Secondary goals:
To achieve these objectives, the Health On the Net Foundation, together with supporting teams,
will develop and deliver materials, and formal training, to all interested parties. The Foundation
will also work with commercial and non-commercial organisations (Project Partners) to provide
information, resources and products to hospitals that wish to take advantage of the benefits
offered by the Internet.
The Project will also gather and distribute case studies of effective Internet use by health and
medical professionals.
This project commenced January 1996 and will achieve its goal of 500 new hospitals on the
Internet by December 1998.
3. Project Plan
3.1 Identify and monitor requirements
Impetus to this project came from a major working conference held in Geneva, September 1995
(see Annex: Health On the Net Foundation) that reviewed the needs of the international medical
community. Further meetings have been held with members of the ITU Development Study
Group on Telemedicine.
From these discussions, it is apparent that the vast majority of medical and health professionals are
unaware of the opportunities offered by the Internet to support them in their work.
Input from medical students will be actively encouraged in the requirements analysis. There is a
clear role in the field of education and to encourage this active participation, the Foundation will
provide funding for post-graduate students wishing to prepare post-graduate theses on
telemedicine.
Continual feedback of medical profession needs will be presented by members of the Foundations
Advisory Board and additional requirements will be solicited through the Foundations World-
Wide Web server (URL http://www.hon.ch).
The foundation has conducted a Survey Feb/March 97 on the
use of the Internet for medical/health purposes to
assess the value, level and ease of use of the Net and attitudes
towards anonymity.
3.2 Awareness Program
Widespread visibility of the goals of this project, combined with active debate and case studies of
hospitals that have already benefited from Internet access will encourage many hospitals to
investigate the value of using the Internet themselves. It is anticipated that this awareness
program will accelerate the decision process for many hospitals that have been considering access
but have not yet taken the final decision.
The awareness program will combine press articles, fact sheets, conference papers and. of course,
a mobilisation of interested parties currently active on the Internet. The Foundation will work
closely with commercial and non-commercial bodies (Project Partners) to reinforce the goals of
the Global Hospital Project and achieve the desired level of visibility. Offers of financial and
technical support have been excellent to date and have included commercial organisations in the
following fields:
The World-Wide Web will be used extensively for awareness communications and will act as a
repository for all materials prepared during this Project. Links will be actively maintained to
Webservers containing information of value to hospitals as well as medical and health
professionals. Clearly, the Web cannot be the sole communications vehicle as target hospitals
currently lack Internet access.
3.3 Preparation of education and training materials
The Project will fund the development of educational materials both within the Foundation and
from external sources. The Project will actively seek help from interested parties that have
already made materials available in the public domain. Discussions have already commenced
with the creators of materials in this field that will help hospitals understand the value of the
Internet to healthcare providers and its role as a telemedicine facilitator.
Materials will be made available initially in English and French. Additional languages will be
supported in 1997.
This project will have very high visibility and will undoubtedly generate due recognition for those
parties that contribute to the preparation of materials.
3.4 Delivery of training
Using the content developed in Section 3.3, conferences and training courses will be conducted in
English and French speaking Regions by a team of presenters and trainers. These individuals will
attend Train-the-Trainer courses and leave, capable of delivering training courses and conference
papers that explain the benefits to hospitals of Internet access and show recipients how to achieve
the maximum benefit from such access.
Trainers will be equipped with training materials, software and manuals that their students and
audiences can use to achieve access rapidly.
It is anticipated that many trainers will already be employed by major training hospitals that have
Internet access and practical experience. It is also anticipated that trainers will include post-
gradate students receiving financial support from the Global Hospital Project while they prepare
telemedicine theses.
3.5 Support
Hospitals will receive the following support from the Global Hospital Project :
4. Milestones
* To determine the number of hospitals that have accessed the Internet as a result of the Global
Hospital Project, a careful record will be maintained of hospitals that have received awareness
materials, attended training and awareness conferences and have subsequently established Internet
access. These hospitals will be surveyed to determine the impact of the Global Hospital Project
on their investment decision.
5. Finance
The estimated cost of the Global Hospital Project is US$3.4 million. To date, over
US$1 million has been offered/contributed by donors. If your organisation is interested in
participating in the Project and becoming a Project Partner, please see the contact information
below.
The potential benefits to project participants are considerable and include;
6. Contact Information
Annex: Health On the Net Foundation details
The Global Health Project is the first of several projects being undertaken by the Health On the Net Foundation.
Health On the Net Foundation hope
the results
of this Survey will help HON and other medical websites
meet the needs of the Net community more effectively.
Other benefits, to non-commercial donors, include:
Secretariat
Health On the Net Foundation
Medical Informatics Division
University Hospital of Geneva
1211 Geneva 14
Switzerland
Tel.: +41 22 372 62 73
Fax: +41 22 372 61 98
E-mail: info@hon.ch
Please contact Mr M.A.Selby
Executive Director
Health On the Net Foundation
Tel/Fax: +41 22 364 12 39
E-mail: Mark.Selby@hon.ch
Please contact Mrs Celia Boyer
Health On the Net Foundation
Tel.: +41 22 372 62 73
Fax: +41 22 372 61 98
E-mail: press@hon.ch
Document Reference GH2
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