The Latest in Remote Presence.

In the classic movie Mr. Smith Goes To Washington, Jimmy Stewart plays an ordinary citizen who challenges the status quo and gets results in Congress.

Telemedicine now has its own “Mr. Smith” – only in this case, he’s “Dr. Reynolds.” Using InTouch Health technology, Dr. Neal Reynolds and four other telemedicine advocates helped convince both chambers of the Maryland general assembly to pass legislation mandating reimbursement for telemedicine services. Dr. Reynolds did a live telemedicine demonstration for the legislators – a neurological examination of a Bell’s palsy patient. Because seeing is believing, Maryland soon joined the ranks of more than a dozen states that have eliminated barriers to telemedicine reimbursement.

These state victories are adding urgency and momentum to pending federal legislation. U.S. Senator Tom Udall of Utah is currently drafting a bill that would give telemedicine a big boost by making physician licenses portable across state lines. The bill faces an uphill fight, and that’s where we can all learn a lesson from Dr. Reynolds.

He could have claimed that he was too busy to deal with legislators. After all, Dr. Reynolds is an Associate Professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine, and the director of the Select Trauma ICU at the R. Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center. But like our cinematic heroes, he felt that some battles were worth the extra effort. So he met with Maryland lawmakers over the course of 18 months, explaining the issues in detail. Because of his expertise, he was later involved in the drafting of the bill.

Here’s how Dr. Reynolds recalls the experience:

“Passage of the bill was greatly helped by our live telemedicine demonstration to both legislative houses supported by InTouch Health. This is a real lesson in civics, and a reminder that private citizens can actually make a difference against the sometimes baffling bureaucracy.”

Spoken like a real-life Jimmy Stewart. Telemedicine needs more everyday heroes like Neal Reynolds – people who are willing to take the small steps needed to win big victories.

Health reform has given us a lot of buzzwords like “accountable care” and the warm-and-fuzzy “medical home.” They try to capture the essence of where reform is taking us: to a patient-centered system where collaborative care provides higher quality, better outcomes and lower costs. By tearing down silos and eliminating redundant tests, everybody wins.

That’s the grand vision anyway. But many healthcare organizations are having a tough time making the transition to this new approach.

To see how collaborative care is supposed to work, just look at the new telestroke program at the University of Cincinnati Neuroscience Institute and University Hospital. This teaching facility has long been in the top 25 of America’s academic medical centers – and the UC Stroke Team was started way back in 1987.

The new telestroke program is powered by ITH’s Remote Presence technology, connecting UC stroke specialists with physicians at UC Health’s West Chester Hospital and Dearborn County Hospital (just across the state line in Lawrenceburg, Indiana).

Here’s how the telestroke program meets the “triple aim” of health reform:

Higher quality care – Patients are quickly examined by a stroke specialist who can see and hear them right at the bedside.

Better outcomes – The program will save more lives – and provide higher quality of life – thanks to faster intervention and greater teamwork.

Lower costs – With Remote Presence, only the most severe stroke cases need to be transported to expensive tertiary centers – and many more patients can remain in facilities close to home.

“This is an important advance for us, and more importantly, for our patients,” says Dr. Opeolu Adeoye, director of the UC telestroke program. “This will allow them to stay closer to home at partner hospitals while still receiving the most advanced care available.”

Those words are almost like a mission statement for health reform. In the old paradigm, there would have been a number of time-squandering steps: local triage, transport to a stroke center, repeat diagnoses. But with telemedicine, the ED doctor, specialist and patient are all communicating in real-time.

Telemedicine is helping providers reach consensus in minutes, not hours. That’s what industry pundits call “collaborative care” – and what stroke survivors call a “miracle.”