Robert T. Joseph, Jr.: Enough with telemedicine; its is patient abandonment

To The Daily Sun,

I got real upset the other day trying to reach a provider at a local hospital. Have had enough. Need to start a revolution against high tech. High technology and medical assessments do not work. Period. Telemedicine is malpractice and poor medical management. This is a lazy way of some practitioners to avoid seeing patients on a one on one basis. It is abandonment at its worse.

Nothing can replace seeing a patient's face, efforts of breathing, establishing baseline vitals (such as blood pressure, temperature, and weight). In addition, many people are not set up for this illegal practice. How can a doctor or nurse practitioner, or physician assistant provide an accurate diagnosis without seeing the patient live? Not going to happen.

It is also a constitutional issue under the First Amendment. One has a right to voice his or her concerns live to the corresponding provider. What has happened is that medical care has become big business, for profit. Each of us has a right to comprehensive, in person medical care. The costs of these systems are astronomical as the tech firms make huge profits from installing and running these systems. It is almost like health care has become a systems of middle persons run by electricity rather than human contact. This is abandonment.

Phone services. Press one, press two, etc., must be eliminated. Hearing challenged people such as this writer find it most frustrating to maneuver through the multiple parades of this ladder of press ones, etc. Have a live operator send the caller directly without spending aggravating minutes trying to reach the designated person. This could be part of Lakes Region's problems, but more importantly, symptomatic of the entire medical field at large. The axiom "KISS" applies, keeping things simple stupid. Today, more time than necessary is spent navigating these robo-operator systems, when one call can be directed to the specific person requested.

Yes there could be a use for high tech in record keeping, billing, etc. Expanding high tech to reach all factions of life is not appropriate (even though they try). If more time was spent on personal patient care instead of expensive electronics, LRGH might be in a better place today. Perhaps many hospital systems could be saved by use of interpersonal methods of caring for patients, rather than high tech.

Has anyone considered the potential for an electrical grid collapse? What plans are in place to cover this?? Generators only work temporarily until the gas or fuel runs out. Then what? All fuel pumps and cash registers are supported by electricity. High technology is woefully unprepared to manage such a drastic disruption to its services. No compelling argument can be made for establishing "high tech doctors and medical systems." Get personal.

Robert T. Joseph, Jr.

New Hampton