Assessing the impact of telemedicine on health care management

Telemedicine is undoubtedly one of the most dynamic developing fields of IT -technologies in health care. From research and development to routine clin ical use of telemedicine applications, decision-makers demand information o n the impact that widespread use will have on structures and processes in h ealth care. To date published evaluations have mostly focused on technical core functio ns. Future evaluation concepts have to consider side-effects the use of tel ematic systems in health care might have. The report of effects should cons ider the 4 major interest groups: patients, providers, third-party payers, and society. Learning from experiences in other IT-fields, system developers can avoid p itfalls that might lead to a poor acceptance of their systems or the discon tinuation of their R&D project at an immature stage.