Universities of Hawaii, Alaska sign ‘tele-health’ agreement

HONOLULU—Representatives of the University of Hawaii at MAnoa’s John A. Burns School of Medicine (JABSOM) and the College of Social Sciences, and the Alaska Federal Health Care Partnership (AFHCP), signed an agreement in Honolulu this week to cooperate in the development and fielding of telehealth technology throughout the Pacific region. 

The medical school’s Telehealth Research Institute and AFHCP will strive to bring better health care to more people at a lower cost through telehealth, which is the delivery of health-related services and information via telecommunications technologies. Telehealth is an expansion of telemedicine—encompassing preventive, promotive, and curative aspects of health-care delivery as well a myriad of technology solutions. 

Beneficiaries of the agreement, which was signed Wednesday at the medical school in Kakaako, will be the residents of Hawaii and Alaska, including federal health-care beneficiaries, those living in remote areas, and other Pacific Island native peoples.