THE VIRTUAL VISIT - USING TELECOMMUNICATIONS TECHNOLOGY TO TAKE CARE OF PATIENTS

Telephone-Linked Care (TLC) technology has been developed and applied as an alternative to and a supplement for office visits as a means to deliver ambulatory care. TLC is used to monitor patients with chronic diseases, counsel patients on important health behaviors, and provide information and support to home caregivers of patients with disabling conditions. TLC speaks to patients over the telephone in their homes u sing computer-controlled digitized human speech. Patients use their te lephone keypad to communicate. TLC conversations last 2-15 minutes per call and take place weekly for periods of at least 3 months. The conv ersations consist of a salutation, password verification, the core cli nical part, and a closing. The structure of the clinical part is simil ar for each of the application groups: chronic disease, health behavio r, and caregiver support. The system architecture consists of linked v oice and database components and their subcomponents. Preliminary eval uation indicates that TLC is well accepted by patients and their provi ders and can improve clinical outcomes.