Prehospital ketamine use by paramedics in the Australian Capital Territory: A 12 month retrospective analysis.

Objective: The aim of this study was to describe prehospital use of ketamine by ACT Ambulance Service, and frequency of endotracheal intubation.

Methods: This was a retrospective study of patients receiving prehospital ketamine between 1 January and 31 December 2013. Episodes were identified from the prehospital electronic patient care records, then linkage to ED records at two receiving hospitals.

Impact of an ultrabroadband emergency department telemedicine system on the care of acutely ill patients and clinicians' work.

Objectives: To evaluate whether introduction of an emergency department (ED) telemedicine system changed patient management and outcome indicators and to investigate clinicians' perceptions of the impact of the system on care provided and on their work.

Design: Before-and-after study of use of the Virtual Critical Care Unit (ViCCU), which uses an ultrabroadband connection allowing real-time audiovisual communication between clinicians at distant sites. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with medical and nursing staff at the end of the study.

Development of a broadband telehealth system for critical care: process and lessons learned.

A broadband telehealth system has been developed for supporting critical care services between a major referral hospital and a rural hospital by transmitting very high-quality, realtime multimedia information, including images, audio and real-time video, over an Internet Protocol (IP)-based network. The technical design team took an iterative and user-centred approach toward the system design. Usability tests with scenario analysis were incorporated into the development process to produce a system that operates seamlessly in the critical care environment.

The ViCCU Project -- achieving virtual presence using Ultrabroadband internet in a Critical Clinical application -- initial results.

The ViCCU (Virtual Critical Care Unit) Project sought to address the problems of shortages of Critical Care staff by developing a system that could use the capabilities of Ultrabroadband networks so as to have a Critical Care Specialist virtually present at a distant location. This is not possible in a clinically useful way with current systems. A new system (ViCCU) was developed and deployed.