Locals Benefit from Telemedicine

Five years have passed since telemedicine service was launched in the country.

The nationwide consultation system that comprises competent medical workers in central hospitals has brought a new lease of life to thousands of patients.

Through online consultations with experienced medical staff and medical operations under their guidance, health workers at county-level hospitals saved the lives of lots of serious cases who should have been dispatched to provincial-level and other higher-level hospitals.

When a two-month-old was in the jaws of death at Onsong County People’s Hospital in the northern tip of the country, local health workers had an immediate video consultation with those of Okryu Children’s Hospital in Pyongyang to make a correct diagnosis and take proper treatment measures for the patient.

Those of Kim Man Yu Hospital, who found out a big tumour from a resident in Phyongsan County, North Hwanghae Province through online consultation and image data, went to the provincial people’s hospital and conducted an operation to remove the tumour weighing several kilograms.

“I couldn’t walk properly due to serious pain in my leg until recently. The doctors in Pyongyang took medical measures through telemedicine. I felt as if they were attending at my side,” said a resident in Rinsan, a mountainous county in North Hwanghae Province, who received medical treatment by a central-level medical team with no trip to Pyongyang.

The online healthcare system has also built up the capacities of health workers.

As it requires them to analyse the development of diseases and lab checklists of patients and take necessary steps on screen and through dialogue, they have become ambitious and fiercely competitive. In the course of this, new treatment methods have been established.

While holding an online consultation with the orthopedic surgeons of Kim Man Yu Hospital over the treatment method of a case of slipped disk, the South Hwanghae Provincial People’s Hospital opted for a new tractoration instead of surgical operation, thereby easing the pain of the patient and shortening the days of hospitalization.

Medical workers in local hospitals conduct operations, which were regarded impossible to do in city- and county-level hospitals, with the help of online medical education by and image consultation with able health workers including professors and PhDs in central hospitals.