Can you hear me? Can you hear me now? How about now?
Telehealth is a game-changing technology, a great equaliser that has the potential to reduce healthcare inequity and facilitate chronic care.
It has the reality, however, of being like this:
Doctor: Hello, can you hear me?
Patient: Hello … hello??
Doctor: Hello Trevor, can you hear me?
Patient: Who? Who’s this?
Doctor: It’s the doctor.
Patient: Who? Oh shit, I can’t hear a friggin’ thing …
Doctor: Hang on, I’ll call back.
Thirty seconds later
Doctor: Hello Trevor, can you hear me now?
Patient: Yes, I can doctor, was that you phoning just earlier?
Doctor: Yes it was.
Patient: How are you? Are you keeping well?
Doctor: Yeah I’m OK, thanks Trevor, how are you?
Patient: Hang on a sec, I’ll just switch the telly off, Margaret loves it on loud.
Doctor: OK.
Patient: There, that’s better … oh hang on a sec she’s only gone and let the dog in, she’s a real yapper … the dog I mean … hang on, I need to let her out.
Doctor: Ok……
Mumbling and yapping; phone goes dead
Doctor: Hello?
Patient: Hello?!
Doctor: Hi Trevor. Are you all right to talk now?
Patient: Yeah, much better, sorry about that.
Doctor: What’s happening, Trevor?
Patient: Did you get the letter from the hospital?
Doctor: What letter?
Patient: Oh they said they’d send it to you as soon as I got out.
Doctor: I didn’t know you were even in, Trevor!
Patient: I was there for a few weeks, I thought you knew?
Doctor: No, nobody told me. What’s the story?
Patient: Well, something to do with my lungs I think, and something about … a DVD or something, I don’t know they didn’t really tell me much when I was in there. Bloody busy place. I was hoping you’d be able to fill me in once I got out. They put me on a heap of tablets though, I’m like a walking chemist’s now!
Doctor: Which tablets did they put you on, Trevor?
Patient: I don’t know, bloody great things they are … like horse tablets.
Doctor: Do you remember what they’re called?
Patient: Nah, I’ve never been great with names, takes me all my time to remember my own sometimes!
Doctor: Does your wife know the names of your new tablets?
Patient: Hang on, I’ll ask her … MARGARET … MARGARET … MY TABLETS … YEAH … NO … I DUNNO … THE DOC WANTS THE NAMES OF ’EM … hang on doc, she’s coming.
Doctor: …
Patient: Oh no, she’s let the bloody dog in again.
Muffled swearing and yapping
Doctor: Are you there?
Phone goes dead
Doctor: Hello?
Patient: Sorry about that, doc, I lost you then, not sure what happened.
Doctor: Have you got your tablets?
Patient: Yeah, hang on, the labels are a bit small, I can’t bloody read them … MARGARET WHERE ARE MY READERS … oh shit.
Doctor: Take your time, Trevor.
Patient: OK, what’s this one … Azit … azito …. azito something.
Doctor: Azithromycin?
Patient: Not sure … ermm … what about this one … oh shit, I’ve just dropped the bloody lot.
Doctor: Why don’t you send me a picture of them, Trevor, and then I’ll know what you’ve been put on.
Patient: Good idea doc, hang on a sec.
Doctor: No, wait!
Phone goes dead
Doctor: Hello??
Patient: Sorry doc, this bloody phone
Doctor: Why don’t we end the conversation now Trevor and then you’ll have time to take a picture of your medication and once you’ve done that you can send the picture through to my phone and that way I can get on and see my next patient and then give you a call back when I know more. And hopefully by then I’ll have your discharge letter too.
Patient: Sure, sorry about that doc, I know you’re a busy man.
Doctor: OK, speak to you soon
Patient: Bye.
Forty-five minutes later
Here we go doc, all my new meds.
