Sustaining and Expanding Telehealth: A Survey of Business Models from Selected Prominent U.S. Telehealth Centers.

Introduction: Telehealth centers across the country, including our own center, are addressing sustainability and best practice business models. We undertook this survey to explore the business models being used at other established telehealth centers. In the literature on telehealth and sustainability, there is a paucity of comparative studies as to how successful telehealth centers function.

Development of a customizable software application for medical imaging analysis and visualization.

Graphics technology has extended medical imaging tools to the hands of surgeons and doctors, beyond the radiology suite. However, a common issue in most medical imaging software is the added complexity for non-radiologists. This paper presents the development of a unique software toolset that is highly customizable and targeted at the general physicians as well as the medical specialists.

Regionalization of surgical services in central Florida: the next step in acute care surgery.

Background: There is a national loss of access to surgeons for emergencies. Contributing factors include reduced numbers of practicing general surgeons, superspecialization, reimbursement issues, emphasis on work and life balance, and medical liability. Regionalizing acute care surgery (ACS), as exists for trauma care, represents a potential solution.

Chimpanzees and retirement.

The subject of sanctuaries for chimpanzees has lately become the topic of a great deal of discussion (Brent, Butler, & Haberstroh, 1997; Committee on Long-Term Care of Chimpanzees, 1997; Dyke, Williams-Blangero, Mamelka, & Goodwin, 1995; Peterson & Goodall, 1993). In the United States, laboratories that use chimpanzees in research are facing a housing crisis. An increase in captive births caused by the initiation of the National Chimpanzee Breeding and Research Program in 1986 (Hobson, Graham, & Rowell, 1991), coupled with the diminished use of chimpanzees as experimental subjects, have led to a large population of chimpanzees considered to be surplus to demand (Blood, Wolfle, & Whitney, 1992).

Understanding the impact of variation in the delivery of healthcare services.

In the past several years, healthcare providers have coped with the financial aspects of managed care and the resultant constraints on revenue. In fact, working with decreasing margins of return has become routine for many providers. Beyond straightforward cost cutting, providers must also consider a variety of other operational factors to achieve success.

Resocialization of a group of ex-laboratory chimpanzees, Pan troglodytes.

In order to determine if socially deprived chimpanzees could establish an integrated social unit and reproduce, a group of wild-born individuals from a single-cage laboratory environment were released onto a small island in a South Florida tourist park in 1975. The present study was undertaken during June and July of 1988 to evaluate the long term results of the experiment and to document the reproductive history of the chimpanzees since their release on the island. The evidence presented in this paper suggests that it is possible for laboratory chimpanzees to be resocialized and to reproduce successfully.