ABSTRACT
The chapter highlights established that implementation of an Intensive care Unit (ICU) telemedicine program can simultaneously improve outcomes and reduce costs at an academic medical center. During the pre-pandemic period of formal ICU telemedicine program growth there was wide recognition that access to high quality specialty medical care was particularly limited among the geographically isolated people served by the health resources and services administration and that the ability of ICU telemedicine programs to improve access to specialty care in these settings was worthy of fiscal support. Equipoise with regard to the ability of ICU telemedicine programs to standardize adult critical care delivery practices and observe clinically important changes in outcomes was driven in no small part by early reports from tertiary centers that failed both to replicate the model. ICU telemedicine critical care best practice review, communication, and remediation achieved significantly higher rates of adherence than daily ICU bedside team review of a reminder list alone.
