The system, being developed under the aegis of the Lions Eye Institute, could allow mobile paramedical professionals to acts as proxies for eye, oral and skin specialists in regions where specialist care is scarce. It lets them collect images of patients using medical imaging equipment and a computer, and transmit them back to a database that can be accessed for diagnosis.
Professor Yogesan Kangagasingam, spokesperson for the Institute, said the technology could cut the cost of patient consultation and help specialists that visit remote regions infrequently plan their trips more effectively.
The National Health and Medical Research Centre has contributed AU$196,000 to the Lyons Institute to aid research and development. The institute's commercial subsidiary, RXNet, has trialled a version of the system geared towards ophthalmology in the northern Western Australian towns of Carnarvon and Moora in the first two months of operation. The system has screened about 200 patients to date.
According Kangagasingam, face-to-face ophthalmology consultations currently cost around AU$60. The Lyons Institute has set a target cost of around AU$20-30 per consultation.
However Kangagasingam said that Australia is behind other countries when it comes to publicly funding e-health services.
"Charging fees for such kinds of consultation is a problem in Australia, but it has been approved in the US and some European countries such as Norway," said Kangagasingam.
Kangagasingam hopes doctors and specialists will be able to charge fees for consultation conducted through RXNet's system within one to two years.
"If anybody has a disease and you miss [it] then it's a problem" he said. "We have to make sure the image quality is excellent".
The Department of Health and Aging has only approved two e-health projects, tele-psychiatry and tele-radiology, for Medicare funding. Neither of the services was approved through the minister's Medical Services Advisory Committee (MSAC) -- they were approved through discretionary powers available to the Minister for Health.
The Department said MSAC takes the 13 months to review and approve applications for listing on the medical benefits schedule. Once an application is approved, more time is required to establish the legislation and instruments to administer the service, and to negotiate funding levels with medical professionals.
Kangagasingam seems keen not to get specialists offside by suggesting their fees would be undercut by the system. He said that the majority of patients using the system do not require additional treatment. He argues that it would let ophthalmologists and other specialist allocate more of their time to high value services.
Ophthalmologists can earn up to AU$1,000 a day for face-to-face consultations but charge AU$4,000 to AU$5,000 an hour for surgery.
