Physician-to-physician consultation via electronic mail: the Walter Reed Army Medical Center Ask a Doc system.

Introduction: Physician-to-physician consultation and discussion have traditionally been conducted by telephone, paper, and "curbside" (face to face meetings). The implementation and use of physician-to-physician consultation via electronic mail in a military health care system has not been reported previously.

Methods: The group mail function of the Composite Health Care System, the main outpatient medical automation system for the Department of Defense, was modified to create mailgroups for every specialty of the Walter Reed Army Medical Center to facilitate ease of physician-to-physician consultation.