Developing telemedicine for rural and marginal suburban locations in Latin America

This chapter presents an overview of the development of telemedicine policies, initiatives, strategies, programs and projects in Latin America. Topics regarding network infrastructure planning, technology selection and system design, including information, operation and management aspects, are examined. Telemedicine service issues associated to primary care, specialist referral, patient identification, remote patient monitoring, diagnostic point-of-care testing, distance learning and training, and mobile telemedicine are taken into account. Other general aspects of telemedicine, such as service performance evaluation, impacts, disadvantages, limitations and challenges are also included in the discussion.