Issuing electrocardiographic reports remotely: experience of the telemedicine network of Santa Catarina.
BACKGROUND
A growing use of telemedicine has been observed, especially as regards the sending and evaluation of electrocardiograms (ECG); this is a low-cost procedure with a high potential to save lives.


OBJECTIVE
To describe the form of systematic analysis and user profile of the Telemedicine Network of Santa Catarina during the time when the report was issued freely.


METHODS
Observational cross-sectional study determining the associations between patient characteristics and electrocardiographic diagnoses issued among users of the Telemedicine Network of Santa Catarina during the time when the report was issued freely. This system was connected to 287 cities in Santa Catarina; the tests were done in the places of origin and the reports were issued in three tertiary-care hospitals. From 2005 to 2010 the reports were issued freely and a probabilistic method for data analysis was created. An experienced cardiologist evaluated all ECGs to assess the chances of abnormality.


RESULTS
243,363 ECGs were evaluated. The majority (58%) was performed on patients older than 50 years from primary care services (72%). There were differences in the frequency per region; this was partly related to the number of cardiologists/region (r = -0.551), to the distance from tertiary-care centers and potential differences of acceptance of the method. Approximately 53% of the ECGs were abnormal with greater frequency with increasing age (r(2) = 0.8166) and with significant regional differences (p < 0.0001).


CONCLUSIONS
We built a data analysis system integrating prevalent terms, probabilistic analysis and specialized dictionaries. The system has covered a significant portion of the population of Santa Catarina, mainly elderly patients from the network of primary healthcare centers and remote regions of the State.
Programa de Pós-graduação em Saúde Coletiva, Departamento de Pediatria, UFSC, Florianópolis, SC, Brasil.
Isabela de Carlos Back
Ide C
Giuliano
Cloves Langendorf
CL
Barcellos Junior
Aldo
A
von Wangenheim
Mário Sérgio Soares de Azeredo
MS
Coutinho
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D017677:Age Distribution; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D001938:Brazil; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D004562:Electrocardiography / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D016347:Medical Records Systems, Computerized / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D008875:Middle Aged; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D017216:Telemedicine / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D055815:Young Adult