title: Aviation medicine: challenges for telemedicine.
abstract: The number and seriousness of medical problems on passenger-carrying aircraft in flight are increasing. Medical incidents occur at a rate of approximately 10-50 per million passengers carried. Medical equipment carried on commercial aircraft is limited to three items: a first-aid kit, an emergency medical kit and sometimes an automatic external defibrillator. Telephone medicine, a lower level of telemedicine support, is well established for commercial air operations. The availability of satellite telecommunications on passenger-carrying aircraft permits more sophisticated forms of telemedicine. Recent telemedicine experiments have involved the transmission of three-lead electrocardiograms (ECGs), heart rate, blood pressure, arterial oxygen saturation, end-tidal CO2, respiratory rate, body temperature and realtime video. The challenge is to demonstrate that such techniques are practicable, improve patient outcomes and are cost-effective.
authors.affiliation: Department of Anatomía Patológica, University of La Laguna, Tenerife, Canary Islands. catai@teide.net
authors.forename: O
authors.initials: O
authors.lastname: Ferrer-Roca
authors.forename: R D
authors.initials: RD
authors.lastname: Díaz De León
authors.forename: F J
authors.initials: FJ
authors.lastname: de Latorre
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Suárez-Delgado
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Di Persia
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Cordo
mesh_terms: D000337:Aerospace Medicine / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence / Q000379:methods* / Q000639:trends; D016887:Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation / Q000379:methods; D004638:Emergency Treatment / Q000379:methods* / Q000592:standards; D005392:First Aid / Q000592:standards; D006801:Humans; D017216:Telemedicine / Q000191:economics / Q000592:standards* / Q000639:trends