Rural hospitals wired to extend care
Tennessee applies grant to expand health care services in the country.
By Emily Bregel Staff Writer
EDITOR’S NOTE: For audio with this story, go to www.timesfreepress.com. A $2 million federal grant that will connect Chattanooga’s largest hospital to smaller rural facilities could have “life-saving” potential for patients in isolated locations, an executive at Copper Basin Medical Center in Copperhill, Tenn., said. “We don’t want to penalize our patients for living in a rural area,” said David Hyatt, interim CEO at the hospital. “This will enable us to offer the same, hopefully, continuity of care (as) if they lived near a larger facility.” The grant is among 69 awards from the Federal Communication Commission’s $417 million pilot program to expand health care access to America’s rural and underserved communities through broadband telehealth networks. Plans call for Erlanger’s broadband network to link to 11 hospitals in Tennessee, Georgia and North Carolina. Ultimately, health care officials hope linking more hospitals through high-speed Internet connections will allow teleconferences, video conferences, the sharing of electronic medical records and produce better quality of care and cost savings. A $7.9 million telehealth grant to Tennessee even could help rural hospitals struggling with work force shortages to have better leverage when recruiting physicians, said Cindy Siler, executive director of the Tennessee Rural Health Recruitment Retention Center. Residents trained in urban areas are accustomed to access
to resources such as continuing education and seminars, she said. “They’re used to all that; then when they get in a rural area, it just compounds the isolation they feel,” she said. “To be able to say to them that there is an effort to do this across the state is just enormous to me. I’ll be able to much better sell the rural community to folks.” Erlanger will work with EPB to give access to highspeed broadband Internet to facilities that don’t have those capabilities, said Roger Forgey, Erlanger’s senior vice president of business development and regional operations. Transfer of digital X-rays and CT scans will allow critically ill patients who are counties away to be monitored by an Erlanger specialist, who typically might visit the rural hospital only once a week, he said. Currently there are pieces of links, Mr. Forgey said. “When you do a telemedicine link, you’re limited to whatever the phone line is out there,” he said. “This broadband utility allows us to go out and transmit information that you otherwise couldn’t transmit.” Mr. Forgey said video consultations made possible by telemedicine links will help cut down on the number of transfer patients who could remain at their local hospitals. David Hill, community services director for Woods Memorial Hospital in Etowah, Tenn., said the hospital’s patients who need specialists such as a dermatologist, gastroenterologist or psychiatrist must drive to urban centers for treatment. “Especially with elderly patients, they don’t feel comfortable driving to Knoxville or Chattanooga. A lot of times they just don’t go,” he said. Video conferencing with specialists in the cities would get those patients needed treatments, he said. “I think it would be a great opportunity for our patients,” he said. STATEWIDE IMPACT The FCC grant expands the existing Tennessee Telehealth Network to 400 more facilities that do not have access to a broadband Internet connection. The grant eventually will allow health care facilities to provide e-prescribing services and to use electronic medical records, said Dave Goetz, state commissioner of Finance and Administration. “I think it’s going to be tremendous,” Bill Jolley, vice president of rural issues for the Tennessee Hospital Association, said of the grant. “It really enables the hospitals to develop partnerships and relationships that haven’t previously existed.” The Department of Finance and Administration will delegate the grant funds to the Community Health Network, a nonprofit group of community health centers in Tennessee. The group led the state application process to create the Tennessee Telehealth Network, which was formed with a $1.6 million state grant last year, said Keith Williams, head of the Community Health Network. For three years the FCC will reimburse rural hospitals and doctors for 85 percent of the cost of a fully managed highspeed Internet connection to the telehealth network, which costs about $6,000 a year, he said. Mr. Williams said his organization will push for more federal funds after the grant expires in three years. “We are expecting the results to be very dramatic,” he said. E-mail Emily Bregel at ebregel@timesfreepress.com ERLANGER NETWORK Rural hospitals to be included in Erlanger’s network: Copper Basin Medical Center (Polk County, Tenn.) Erlanger Bledsoe (Bledsoe County, Tenn.) Murphy Medical Center (Cherokee County, N.C.) North Valley Medical Center (Sequatchie County, Tenn.) Rhea Medical Center (Rhea County, Tenn.) Woods Memorial Hospital (McMinn County, Tenn.) Grandview Medical Center (Marion County, Tenn.) Hutcheson Medical Center (Walker County, Ga.) SkyRidge Medical Center (Bradley County, Tenn.) Athens Regional Medical Center (McMinn County, Tenn.) Hamilton Medical Center (Whitfield County, Ga.) Staff Photo by John Rawlston Doresa Griffin sorts papers in the health information department of the Copper Basin Medical Center in Polk County. The facility is one of those benefiting from a federal grant that helps link urban and rural hospitals through the Internet.
