Medical advice by phone

From an article in Newsweek by Annetta Miller and Lourdes Rosado, monitored for the Institute by Roger Knights.

A recent development in health care in the States is for high-tech methods of connecting patients with health information:

- The Doctors By Phone service in New York offers medical advice for $3 a minute. It is staffed by 80 physicians, who are paid L40 an hour to advise callers on everything from Lyme disease to chapped lips. Most callers are not experiencing medical emergencies but want general information.
- Ask the Pharmacists, in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, charges $1.95 a minute for a phone-operated pharmaceutical advice service.

'Connect by modem over the phone to access d.i.y. diagnostic computer programs'

- The San-Francisco-based InterPractice Systems is restricted to patients of its health maintenance organisation, but allows them to connect by modem over the phone to get answers to medical questions and to access d.i.y. diagnostic computer programs. InterPractice's chief executive officer, Dr Albert Martin, believes that by eliminating unnecessary office visits, the program could cut operating costs by 20%.

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