More on KentOnline
More on KentOnline
Patients in west Kent will be offered appointments with hospital doctors from the comfort of their own home - or even at work or school - through a Skype-style video consultation service.
Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust is one of only nine in England that have been selected to pilot the virtual service, which will allow certain patients to 'attend' appointments remotely using a computer or mobile device.
Sexual Health, Specialist Medicine and Emergency Department services will all test the system, with the first clinics due to start over the next few weeks.
If successful, the service could then be rolled out more widely in other departments and by other trusts nationwide.
Demonstrations and engagement events were held in both Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells over the last fortnight, attended by nurses, doctors, GPs, commissioners, IT and procurement bosses as well as representatives from the local prison service.
The aim, health chiefs say, is to reduce to the need for patients to travel to the hospital and take time off work or school.
Suitable patients will be offered the opportunity over the coming weeks, but they are not obliged to accept, and can still take up a face-to-face appointment if preferred.
Those who accept the offer of a video appointment will need a reliable internet connection, webcam and microphone to use the service on their favoured device.
The trust is also being asked to plan how it will work with clinical commissioning groups and GPs to deliver an online consultation offer in each practice by April 2020 and a video consultation offer to all patients by April 2021.
Last year, a virtual GP surgery, called MedicSpot, opened within a pharmacy on the Isle of Sheppey.
The service was said to be the first of its kind in Kent and meant patients could not only just speak to a doctor via a video link but also be examined using digital diagnostic equipment that is hooked up to the computer.
