Member Avatar for Lisa Hoover

As President Obama's economic stimulus package winds its way through the politico, people in the tech sector wait with bated breath to find out what it will mean for the IT industry. Of particular interest is the section of the bill that details how the administration plans to go about digitizing medical records.

Once the details are figured out, you can bet software vendors all over the country will swing into action developing products to process, secure, and transmit medical records. Too bad they'll be a day late to the party.

Seattle-based Remote Medical has already been assisting emergency medical crews around the world via specialized phone- and computer-based software. Founded seven years ago by 30 year-old Andrew Cull, the company's 67 employees provide telemedical services 24/7 for rescue crews facing extreme situations.

"The 30-year-old paramedic-turned-chief executive may be dispatching a helicopter to rescue a fallen mountain climber in Nepal or overseeing the evacuation of a sick scientist from a research station in the South Pacific," says Brier Dudley, who recently chronicled the company in an article for the Seattle Times.

Though the company offers hands-on first aid classes, rescue training, and a variety of specialized services, Dudley notes that Remote Medical stands out as a snapshot of how closely medical services and technology are expected to be connected in the future.

"Remote Medical's gains haven't come from any particular device, although its doctors and medics share information via iPhones, MacBooks, BlackBerries and satellite phones. A medic may transfer EKG readings to an iPhone and send them ahead to the hospital, or connect a laptop to a satellite phone and videoconference with a physician in the U.S."

No one knows exactly what shape Obama's medical information directives will take, but it's clear that companies like Remote Medical will be leading the pack when the picture starts to become clear.

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raised a good early question about where field medicine and IT would meet. ’s point about document-management expertise and ’s later observation about widespread EHR rollout highlight two lasting truths: the technology exists, and the hard part is making it fit real clinical work. ’s clinical note is useful background but sits outside the thread’s technology focus.

Practical priorities for anyone building or buying emergency telemedicine today:

  • Interoperability first — use standards so prehospital data can flow into hospital systems and registries (structured data, timestamps, and consistent patient IDs matter).
  • Security and governance — enforce strong encryption, device management, role-based access, and clear audit trails; have a tested breach-response plan.
  • Offline-first design — expect poor or intermittent networks; apps must cache, checksum, and queue data reliably for later upload.
  • Clinician-centered workflows — reduce extra typing with templates, pre-filled fields and limited mandatory items; measure time burden during pilots.
  • Measurement and oversight — define success metrics (data completeness, time-to-intervention, usability) and run short, focused pilots before wide rollout.

Common pitfalls to avoid:

  • Choosing proprietary formats that block integration.
  • Skipping realistic field testing under poor connectivity.
  • Treating training as optional — human factors drive adoption more than features.

Quick checklist for EMS teams evaluating solutions:

  • Confirm export/import via current interoperability standards.
  • Run a 60–90 day pilot with defined metrics and clinician champions.
  • Verify device management, encryption, and retention policy details.
  • Train end users in the field workflow and reassess after initial runs.
  • Involve legal/compliance early to confirm local privacy and retention rules.

Caution: regulatory requirements and best practices evolve. Treat clinical validation, usable workflows, and legal review as essential parts of any deployment.

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Member Avatar for Techwriter10

I think this is going to have a huge impact on document management vendors who can help companies manage medical records in the same fashion as any other document type, but companies like the one you cite with a background and experience in the niche, will certainly have an upper hand.

Ron

Member Avatar for jdizon

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Member Avatar for Steven Kenneth

10 years later, here we are in that exact scenario where there are many vendors trying to perfect the EMR / HER softwares. Even though the physicians are finding it time consuming to fill them out, we are in the process of digitalising the records and may be another 10 years later, this will become the norm.

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