ATA publishes 'A blueprint for telerehabilitation guidelines'

American Telemedicine AssociationNov 15 2010

The American Telemedicine Association (ATA) has just announced its latest standard publication, 'A Blueprint for Telerehabilitation Guidelines,' which discusses the key administrative, clinical technical and ethical principles that should be considered in the course of providing telerehabilitation services. The purpose of these guidelines is to inform and assist practitioners in providing effective and safe services based on client needs, current empirical evidence, and available technologies.

"The Telerehabilitation Guidelines, as with all our standards documents, represents a formalized record of best practices in the discipline, based on empirical data and clinical experience," said Jonathan Linkous, Chief Executive Officer of the American Telemedicine Association. "The standardization of such practices will ensure that telemedicine delivers the highest quality healthcare services and, ultimately, becomes a standard of care for patients."

The Telerehabilitation Guidelines are the latest addition to ATA's roster of standards documents. Other guideline publications include: Core Standards for Telemedicine Operations, Practice Guidelines for Videoconferencing-Based Telemental health, Evidence-Based Practices for Telemental Health, Practice Guidelines for Teledermatology, Telehealth Practice Recommendations for Diabetic Retinopathy and Home Telehealth Clinical Guidelines. Standards documents are developed by subject experts in the ATA membership and key stakeholder groups, in collaboration with the appropriate outside medical societies. All ATA Standards and Guidelines documents are available, free of charge, on the ATA website, www.americantelemed.org/standards.

ATA has also recently established new working groups to develop practice guidelines in two high-priority application areas: Real-Time Web-Based Telehealth and Remote Data Management.