WA Governor Kerry Sanderson, with Goldfields telehealth coordinator Jason Grimes and Dr Fiona Wood on the screen
25 May 2016
The Western Australian Governor, Her Excellency Hon Kerry Sanderson AO, visited the Kalgoorlie Health Campus recently and saw first-hand how telehealth was being used to bring the State’s best specialists to the virtual bedside of local patients.
Goldfields regional telehealth coordinator Jason Grimes put the 21st century technology through its paces by setting up a videoconference between WA burns specialist Dr Fiona Wood and Kalgoorlie burns patient Emma Gleeson.
Professor Wood has been treating Emma via telehealth after a serious dirt bike accident left the 30-year-old Kalgoorlie woman with serious burns requiring multiple skin grafts.
Professor Wood recently spoke in the media about the benefits of telehealth (external site), and she used the technology to successfully guide and supervise Emma through the “tissue expansion procedure”, a five-month process during with Emma injected saline into her own leg to grow new skin.
The Governor also linked in via telehealth from Kalgoorlie Hospital’s ED to Leonora Hospital ED, where Director of Nursing Denese Mahoney demonstrated how they use specialist emergency telehealth support from Perth and Kalgoorlie.
Goldfields regional director Geraldine Ennis said emergency telehealth was now used across the region to link our smaller hospitals and nursing posts with emergency physicians in Kalgoorlie or Perth to assess and treat victims of serious illness and injury such as road crashes.
Patients are also able to use videoconferencing to consult with their specialists, enabling follow-up treatment and care to be carried out locally rather than patients having to travel to Perth.