title: Communication technologies and applications in a medical environment.
abstract: As we move into the next millennium, we anticipate a rapid introduction of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) into the medical environment. In applying these technologies in Health Care Environments, the basic goals are to improve: (a) the collaboration between the different partners in the health sector, (b) the access to care and (c) the medical education, and to enhance overall quality (by increasing the availability of some applications, improve the quality of others and facilitate some completely new ones), and all these at affordable cost. This requires close interaction between health care practitioners and information technologists to ensure that the proposed technologies satisfy current user's needs, and anticipate future. The public awareness and the acceptance of the new medical environments by the users are key factors for successful implementations.
authors.affiliation: Dept. of Informatics, University of Thessaloniki, Greece. apombo@csd.auth.gr
authors.forename: A S
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Pombortsis
mesh_terms: D003195:Computer Communication Networks; D006801:Humans; D008491:Medical Informatics Applications; D013685:Telecommunications