telemedicine

Decades ago, technology was primitive in medicine. Tests were limited to blood work, and x-rays were our most sophisticated imaging. Lacking machines to diagnose our patients, we relied heavily on a physical examination. Hospital care now begins with tests, and until all test results are in no treatments take place. In the meantime, the patient languishes, often unattended, his condition unknown. Few doctors bother with a physical examination, that is the “laying on of hands” [1] where the patient is subjected a physical examination. No one takes the patient’s clinical history, asking about his past health and that of his relatives. What illnesses lurk in his family history remain a mystery. The effect of these kinds of omissions is that no one ever evaluates the entire patient, their physical state, their interacting ailments, their hereditary risks.