Abstract
The conflict in Syria has created the largest humanitarian emergency of the twenty-first century. The 4-year Syrian conflict has destroyed hospitals and severely reduced the capacity of intensive care units (ICUs) and on-site intensivists. The crisis has triggered attempts from abroad to support the medical care of severely injured and acutely ill civilians inside Syria, including application of telemedicine. Within the United States, tele-ICU programs have been operating for more than a decade, albeit with high start-up costs and generally long development times. With the benefit of lessons drawn from those domestic models, the Syria Tele-ICU program was launched in December 2012 to manage the care of ICU patients in parts of Syria by using inexpensive, off-the-shelf video cameras, free social media applications, and a volunteer network of Arabic-speaking intensivists in North America and Europe. Within 1 year, 90 patients per month in three ICUs were receiving tele-ICU services. At the end of 2015, a network of approximately 20 participating intensivists was providing clinical decision support 24 hours per day to five civilian ICUs in Syria. The volunteer clinicians manage patients at a distance of more than 6,000 miles, sepa...Continue Reading
Citations
Sep 22, 2016·Cytopathology : Official Journal of the British Society for Clinical Cytology·D C Wilbur
Jan 4, 2018·Telemedicine Journal and E-health : the Official Journal of the American Telemedicine Association·Charles R DoarnRaed Arafat
Nov 10, 2018·The European Respiratory Journal·John D BlakeyRichard W Costello
Dec 19, 2019·Critical Care Medicine·Sanjay SubramanianVitaly Herasevich
Nov 30, 2019·Globalization and Health·Nassim El AchiPreeti Patel
Mar 25, 2020·Critical Care Medicine·Sanjay SubramanianVitaly Herasevich
May 16, 2020·Telemedicine Journal and E-health : the Official Journal of the American Telemedicine Association·Rifat Latifi, Charles R Doarn
May 28, 2020·Telemedicine Journal and E-health : the Official Journal of the American Telemedicine Association·Benjamin K ScottJeremy C Pamplin
May 11, 2017·World Journal of Surgery·Grace BauhahnEdward C T H Tan
Dec 28, 2018·Implementation Science : IS·H Manisha Yapa, Till Bärnighausen
Jan 28, 2021·Military Medicine·Kristina M IeronimakisJeremy C Pamplin
Nov 13, 2020·Frontiers in Public Health·Sonu BhaskarDaniel Ray
Apr 17, 2021·Health Policy and Planning·Gemma BowsherPreeti Patel