Telemedicine (for editorial comment, see page 58)

Abstract

Ideally, health care is a communication‐intensive process and information that relates to problem‐solving and treatment regimens is exchanged constantly among health workers and between patients and their health‐care providers. The primary health‐care teams in a remote area of Queensland were linked with their base hospital, regional hospitals, a teaching hospital and an aerial retrieval team by means of AUSSAT 1. This article describes the changes in the health workers' consultations and in their patient‐management practices when they used the satellite communications network. These changes resulted in improved health care and reduced some health‐care costs.