Clearwater Valley Hospital and Clinics, Inc. Administration
301 Cedar St.
Orofino, ID 83209-8174
www.smh-cvhc.org

Pam McBride
Ph: 208-289-5509
Fax: 208-289-2437
Email: peterpam@tds.net

Network Partners: St. Mary’s Hospital, 701 Lewiston St., Cottonwood, ID 83522; clinics in Orofino, Cottonwood, Kamiah, Pierce, Kooskia, Nezperce, Craigmont, and Grangeville, ID.

Project Purpose: Bring safer, more effective health care to clinics and hospitals in a 3-county region of frontier northcentral Idaho. Hardware and software will be purchased and installed for a joint electronic medical records deployment involving 2 critical access hospitals and 12 associated clinics. Intensive training will be provided for effective use of the software. Physicians will be able to view patient charts instantly from any system location or from home. Standardized patient records will alert busy physicians to drug contraindications, allergies, and anomalous lab results.

Outcomes Expected: Hardware and software installation—task completion on project tracking system; paid invoices; training—task completion on project tracking system; go-live implementation for each software
module.

Service Area: 3 contiguous counties in frontier north-central Idaho, serving 14 HPSAs and 3 MUAs. All have whole country Geographic Mental Health HPSAs. Clearwater—MUA and Geographic Primary Care HPSA
and pending low-income Population Group HPSA in Primary Care, also a whole county Population Group HPSA in Dental Health for low-income; Lewis—Geographic and Facility Primary Care HPSAs, MUA and MUP designations; Idaho—low-income Population Group and Geographic HPSAs in Primary Care, Geographic HPSA in Dental Health.

Services Provided: Clearwater Valley and St. Mary’s Hospitals and their associated clinics joined forces in 1998. They provide primary and acute care services, including surgery, OB, home health, and physical therapy. Both hospitals have digital library services. All sites expect to implement EMR in 2006. Teleradiology services may be expanded.

Equipment: Meditech and LSS Data software modules; network servers and personal workstations and printers.

Transmission: Full T1 lines between hospitals and Kamiah clinic; wireless or dial-up internet access at clinic sites; vpn tunnel between sites.

Telehealth Idaho
ISU Campus Box 8174
Pocatello, ID 83209-8174
www.isu.edu/irh & www.telida.isu.edu

B. Hudnall Stamm, PhD
Ph: 208-282-4436
Fax: 208-282-4074
Email: telida@isu.edu

Network Partners: Community: 12 hospitals, 2 clinics, 1 dental practice, 1 hospital network (5 hospitals), and 4 State associations. University: The College of Pharmacy, Idaho Health Sciences Library, Dental Sciences, Clinical Psychology, Dept. of Family Medicine, and Hispanic Health Research & Education Center. Corporate: Healthwise, Inc. and Well Diagnostics.

Project Purpose: Improve access in rural and frontier Idaho and support a Statewide telehealth resource center designed to improve access across the spectrum of health care, including oral, physical, and mental/behavioral health. The program takes a three-pronged approach to improving access by (a) increasing the number of providers through new and upgraded education, (b) extending the reach of existing providers by using telehealth-based supervision, consultation, home health and (c) preserving the existing workforce through professional support and increasing their professional quality of life and retention.

Outcomes Expected: Telehealth Idaho is based on the hypothesis that telehealth can be used as an effective intervention for reducing the negative effects and increasing the positive effects of working in isolated and lowinfrastructure areas. It has a variety of expected outcomes and methods of measuring them. Below is a generalized summary of the evaluation of the project.1) Increased Professional Quality of Life –outcome measures: Life Status Review & ProQOL (http://www.isu.edu/~bhstamm/tests.htm), increased recruitment and retention, increased access to professional supports, increased use of educational and consultative activity, perceived increase in ability to do job, increased perception of changing practice habits based on additional knowledge and resources. 2) atient/provider/student satisfaction – outcome measures: 1 to 10-item self-report. 3) Increased use of telehealth tools (education, consultation, and informatics) – Outcome measures: OAT GPRA Performance measures, automated web utilization data, quarterly selfreport of utilization data, key informants, focus groups, and public health data.

Service Area: Entire state of Idaho. The 44 counties include 36 HPSAs, 30 DPSAs, 44 MPSAs, 28 MUAs.

Services Provided: Technical support, digital medical library, clinical services, new and continuing health professions education, and the Tel Ida Toolbox, a health informatics website. Specializations include
professional quality of life, geriatrics, traumatic brain injury, community integration, mental health, health services, health economics, traumatic stress, and cultural competency.

Equipment: Wide range, including virtual program centers and Webconferencing applications, as requested by partners. Emphasis is on interoperability, data security, and HIPAA compliance.

Transmission: Hybrid, utilizing what is available (i.e. POTS, ISDN, ADSL, cable, and wireless).

North Idaho Rural Health Consortium
Bonner General Hospital
P.O. Box 1448
Sandpoint, ID 83864
www.nirhc.org

Sue Fox, MPH
Ph: 208-265-3390
Fax: 208-265-6276
Email: suefox@sandpoint.net

Network Partners: Five northern Idaho county hospitals in St. Maries, Sandpoint, Bonners Ferry, Coeur d’ Alene, and Kellogg; three school districts in Wallace, Kootenai, and Priest River; and North Idaho
Behavioral Health.

Project Purpose: 1. Extend existing service providers, by further developing and expanding telehealth treatment applications, to better serve the rural population of northern Idaho. 2. Increase access to quality healthcare and improve patient safety through the use of telecommunications and digital technologies specifically in the areas of mental health, hospital and school based rehabilitative therapies, pathology, pharmacy, and electronic medical records.

Outcomes Expected: EXTEND will evaluate of the feasibility, quality of care, cost-effectiveness, satisfaction, and outcomes data related to delivering healthcare using telehealth techniques. Quantitative and qualitative measurements are integrated into each telehealth application.

Service Area: 5 counties in northern Idaho.

Services Provided: Electronic Medical Records (2005), telepharmacy (2004), telepathology (2004), hospital and school based telerehabilitative therapies (2003), telemental health (2002), professional continuing medical
education (1996), distance learning (1996), and administrative meetings (1996).

Equipment: Tandberg 880 videoconferencing unit, Polycom FX viewstation, and Vtel TC2000 videoconferencing unit.

Transmission: IP Wide Area Network (WAN) between hospitals with Primary Rate ISDN gateway access to the school district networks.