Salt Lake City-based Intermountain Healthcare improves infectious disease care and antibiotic prescriptions through its Infectious Diseases TeleHealth program, according to a post on the health system's blog.
The program provides consultations with infectious diseases physicians to patients and staff at Intermountain Healthcare's small hospitals. The telehealth program is a type of antibiotic stewardship program, which seeks to optimize antibiotic use in hospitals; antibiotic stewardship programs are mandatory at all hospitals in the United States under Joint Commission regulations, according to the blog post.
The Infectious Diseases TeleHealth program has been deployed at Logan Regional Hospital, Riverton Hospital, Alta View Hospital and Park City Hospital in Utah. Intermountain Healthcare plans to bring its remaining small hospitals into the program by April 2017.