Profiling and comparison of telemedicine systems; some methodological considerations

Abstract

Telemedicine is the use of ICT in order to provide clinical healthcare at a distance. WHO and OECD assume that telemedicine may improve the healthcare systems efficiency, thus they encourage the practice of telemedicine and make uniform recommendations to all their member countries. Nevertheless, none of these organizations precisely characterize telemedicine considering its place into the healthcare system and its institutional arrangement. This paper aims at characterizing a telemedicine system as an element of healthcare system in order to propose an international comparison methodology allowing to establish a relationship between production and institutions.