International Telemedicine Academy
Fast development of computer technologies contributed to their wide
employment in many fields of medical activity. This concerns e.g. the application of
new methods of signal registration and computer-based multimedia and
teleinformatics to diagnostics, prophylactics and treatment of diseases of circulatory
system, hearing, sight and many others. As it becomes common for computers in
schools and community health centres to be connected to the Internet, modern
technological means can be developed for facilitating prophylactics activities,
diagnostics and treatment.
Telemedical methods and systems utilising modern digital technologies can be introduced more efficiently once there are suitable numbers of properly trained personnel available. Clearly visible perspectives for advancement of telemedicine & telepathology form an exceptionally advantageous chance for undertaking various initiatives and endeavours, which would have a chance for dynamic development and playing a significant social role. One of such initiatives could be founding of an higher education enterprise, which would be involved in both R&D work and training of highly-specialised personnel.
A serious barrier for further development and employment of large-scale telemedical applications is the lack of appropriately trained personnel who could work on advancement and popularisation of telemedical tools for diagnosis and rehabilitation. In particular, using these tools in consulting rooms, schools and companies requires systematic training and specialised practical courses. For example, in our country there is demand for covering all the school pupils with epidemiology tests concerning hearing loss, vision loss, speech dysfunctions, dyslexia, dysorthography etc. This would require reaching ca. 30.000 schools with training devoted to performing epidemiology tests with telemedical applications developed earlier, as well as popularising knowledge and practical skills concerning telemedicine.
Telemedicine as scientific and practical discipline is still considered a novelty in the global scale. It is strictly interdisciplinary in character, combining medicine, computer science, telecommunications, biomedical engineering, psychology, electronics as well as certain branches of physics (e.g. acoustics and optics) and mathematics (data analysis). Such a wide scope of education is not provided by any single course taught at a university, in Poland. It is also difficult to find similar initiatives abroad. For that reason one cannot expect to find specialists possessing the required knowledge of all the listed sciences. Such specialists can only be educated by specifically selected academic personnel working on the basis of a carefully designed and continuously updated programme of studies. Such education process could be realised in appropriate conditions and on desired level only at a specialised higher education enterprise. As the new course being discussed depends in an unusual degree on the current state of technology and on newest conceptual advances in the involved fields, such university needs to be founded in direct cooperation with leading foreign research centres. This is possible thanks to past cooperation of the initiators with leading centres located in many countries. Particular advantage is provided by the International Center for Hearing and Speech launched in 2003 in Kajetany - a clinical facility equipped with a state-of-the-art set of computer utilities and with conference rooms equipped with advanced teleconference equipment.
The above considerations show that the technology of information exchange via the Internet and telephone and satellite links required by the new university can be directly utilised for organising remote events and education sessions using the distance learning approach. For these reasons the university should be founded from the very beginning as an international facility, in which international cooperation would constitute the majority of realised tasks and planned projects.
The new university would therefore be founded with the aim of performing R&D works in telemedicine and educating specialists in this dynamically-developing interdisciplinary field, utilising domestic academic staff aided by direct international cooperation.
Prof. Henryk Skarżyński
Prof. Andrzej Czyżewski