Dr. Ed Brown, CEO and founder of OTN (right), presents North East LHIN CEO Louise Paquette with the inaugural Champions of Telemedicine Award as Christine Meyer, OTN Senior Director (left), and Tamara Shewciw, North East LHIN Chief Information Officer, look on. Submitted photo.
Louise Paquette, Chief Executive Officer of the North East Local Health Integration Network (NE LHIN) has been honoured with an inaugural Champions of Telemedicine Award from the Ontario Telemedicine Network (OTN) for her work in helping more Northerners access care through the unique telemedicine technology.
“In her role as CEO, she has spearheaded the use of telemedicine across the region and was a key player in the development of OTN in the North,” said Dr. Ed Brown, OTN’s founder and chief executive officer, upon presenting her the award at the NE LHIN’s Sudbury office on Thursday.
The NE LHIN has the most active telemedicine sites of all LHINs at 300 – an amount which has expanded more than five-fold since 2007. The NE LHIN has supported the expanded use of this technology by funding telemedicine nursing positions, partnering with OTN to host forums on its use, and promoting initiatives that make use of its technology like Telehomecare.
The NE LHIN is one of the early adopters of Telehomecare.
So far more than 1,500 Northerners have participated in the program which pairs people living with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) or heart failure with nursing coaches and remote sensing technology to learn how to better self-manage their chronic conditions. Not only does Telehomecare improve quality of life for its users, it also helps them to avoid unnecessary trips to a hospital’s emergency department or hospitalization.
“As a Northerner, I know that it isn’t always easy to access specialist care without having to spend time and money travelling,” said Paquette. “Making better use of technology to deliver health care is our Northern ticket to increasing access to care closer to home.”
