College of Pharmacy
123 Sudro Hall
Fargo, ND 58105
telepharmacy.ndsu.nodak.edu

Charles D. Peterson, PharmD
Ph: 701-231-7609
Fax: 701-231-7606
Email: Charles.Peterson@ndsu.edu

Network Partners: Licensed rural community and hospital pharmacists and pharmacies, rural communities, North Dakota State Board of Pharmacy, and North Dakota State Pharmaceutical Association.

Project Purpose: To establish, restore, or retain pharmacy services in medically underserved rural communities in North Dakota through the use of telepharmacy technology. To allow a licensed pharmacist at a central
pharmacy site to supervise a registered pharmacy technician at a remote telepharmacy site in processing prescriptions for patients. Activities are in full compliance with all rules and regulations for the practice of pharmacy in the State as established by the North Dakota State Board of Pharmacy.

Outcomes Expected: To provide rural citizens with access to a pharmacist health professional and pharmacy services in their own community; to improve economic development in remote rural communities by building new
businesses and adding new jobs; by building new businesses and adding new jobs; to improve recruitment and retention of pharmacists in rural areas; to make rural pharmacies more attractive as a business; to provide relief help for sick-time, vacations, and professional leave for pharmacists practicing in rural areas; to provide educational opportunities for pharmacy students at the University.

Service Area: Since September 2002, 57 pharmacies in 29 MUA counties in North Dakota and two in Minnesota are participating in delivering telepharmacy services including 21 central sites serving 36 remote telepharmacy sites with 44 being retail pharmacies and 13 being hospital pharmacies serving a
population of more than 40,000 rural citizens.

Equipment: Pharmacy operations software on a standard PC computer; digital imaging camera; Polycom-FX or VSX video conferencing equipment; VPN/firewall, and 20” television monitor, located at both remote telepharmacy spoke site and central pharmacy hub site.

Transmission: Transmitted over the Internet using DSL lines at 512K bandwidth or dedicated fractional T1 and secured through a VPN/firewall.

St. Alexius Medical Center
900 East Broadway
PO Box 5510
Bismarck, ND 58506-5510
www.st.alexius.org

Nancy R. Willis/Tim Cox, FACHE
Nancy R. Willis, Director
Ph: 701-530-7615
Fax: 701-530-7099
Email: nwillis@primecare.org

Network Partners: Northland Healthcare Alliance, North Dakota: Ashley Medical Center, Missouri Slope Clinic (Beulah), Carrington Hospital (Carrington), St. Joseph’s Hospital and Health Center and Great Plains Clinic (Dickinson), Garrison Memorial Hospital (Garrison), St. Aloisius Hospital (Harvey), Sakakawea Medical Center (Hazen), West River Regional Health Center (Hettinger), Linton Medical Center (Linton), Presentation Medical Center (Rolla), Strasburg Nursing Home (Strasburg), Community Memorial Hospital (Turtle Lake), Mercy Medical Center (Williston), Wishek Community Hospital and Clinics (Wishek). South Dakota: Isabel Clinic, McLaughlin Clinic (McLaughlin), Mobridge Regional Hospital and Clinics (Mobridge).

Project Purpose: Provide health-related services at provider, patient and community request including clinical visits, clinical consults, professional and community education, disaster preparedness training and administrative functions.

Outcomes Expected: Clinical outcomes for all services would be equal to outcomes expected for outpatient care within the Medical Center and in compliance with all JCAHO standards and Medicare quality expectations.
Speech therapy outcomes are those used by therapist to determine quality of life improvement in and return as much as possible to normalcy. Speech therapists use a specific rehabilitation assessment tool to gauge these. For educational outcomes we use standard educational outcomes required by
accrediting bodies for students graduating from our paramedic programs, and for other educational activities the appropriate educational objectives are expected to be met. Outcomes for all activities is 100% customer satisfaction that is measured on evaluation tools used specifically for each audience
(providers, patients, customers).

Service Area: Central and Western ND, Eastern Montana and North Central South Dakota.

Services Provided: Specialty consults to rural physicians; specialty visits to rural patients; speech therapy, medication and wound management to nursing homes; professional education to physicians and other staff at clinics, nursing homes and hospitals, including leadership training; videoconferencing services
for administrative meetings throughout the network so that members can avoid needless travel. A number of support groups also meet system-wide (e.g. Alzheimer’s) and care conferences among professionals are conducted at various facilities. In addition more specialized care can be accessed through ISDN to areas outside of our service area (e.g. burn services—Regions Medical Center, Minneapolis, MN).

Equipment: NEC TeleDocs with Canon exam cameras, and Kodak digitizers for teleradiology purposes. Polycoms for connecting to the state interactive video network; PACS system for radiology; televisionmonitors of various brands; Codian bridge.

Transmission: Currently we use point-to-point full T-1 lines to all sites. Some sites are piggy-backed on these lines (e.g. more than one site to a line). We will be moving to an ATM network using video over IP. This network will allow for full T-1 lines to all sites with no piggybacking and will have the capability of voice over IP. We stream data to some of our sites using these same T-1 lines.