Tele-4-Life: An Application for Information Sharing among Healthcare Professionals and Referral Platform

Abstract

Introduction Overtime doctors have been monitored in Thailand for many years and are most affected by human error communication when general doctors consult with specialists who must provide a large amount of patient data. Although nowadays telemedicine has become widespread, it rarely covers professional consultation before deciding to refer patients. Therefore, we create Tele-4-Life, a patient referral platform between specialists and doctors in local hospitals because we desire to develop a one-stop service application including a consultation process, for example, recording accuracy, file transfer, data storage, confidentiality, and referral form online.

Methods The use of telemedicine in Thailand, ThaiRefer, and in the USA, CarePICS, were searched on PubMed, Google Scholar, and other websites to study telemedicine errors and gather information to improve the life quality of physicians. This application is designed to solve problems that Thailand has not yet solved from a telemedicine perspective. Moreover, since it is a government app and acts as a one-stop service, so no information is leaked from the app.

Findings The following main factors are distinguished:

1. Miscommunication among physicians due to the overload of patient data.


2. Patient database confidentiality related to the data breach.


3. The delay of referral via the data provided by handwriting.

Proposed solutions Tele-4-Life integrates Thai patient database and brings the benefits of medical consultations with features as follows:

1. Laboratory examinations are accessible online in addition to the video call option between general physicians and specialists.


2. Providing online referral forms which could be accessed between hospitals.


3. The application could be regulated by Thai Ministry of Public Health.

Conclusion Implementation of Tele-4-Life in Thai healthcare system will improve the efficiency of patient care and minimize human error at multiple levels. When all required data are collected in one location, decision-making during treatment and referrals should be accelerated. Furthermore, it would alleviate the scarcity of medical professionals and equipment. Overall, this application aims to provide a sustainable solution for comprehensive patient care and patient database allocation.