October 2009


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Professor Zulaika Ali became a Consultant Neonatologist at the Mt Hope Women’s Hospital in 1981 and soon got involved in arranging for corrective cardiac and other surgeries for affected newborn babies at overseas centres. She saw the need for a costeffective programme to diagnose, treat and manage complex problems in patients whose parents could not afford such medical care which was not available locally. Thus, the UWI Telehealth Programme was born.

The UWI Telehealth Programme is a partnership between the Child Health Unit, Faculty of Medical Sciences, UWI, the Ministry of Health, Hospital for SickKids (SK H), Toronto Canada and Atlantic LNG of Trinidad & Tobago, Atlantic for Children Fund.

It was meant to enable patients to access medical treatment not available locally, to strengthen undergraduate, postgraduate and continuing medical education programmes and to support relevant collaborative research.

Patients are referred to the Telehealth Programme from government clinics, hospitals private practitioners, media, friends and family who have benefited from this service. The Programme’s paediatrician assesses the need for foreign consultation and if needed, the referral is then forwarded to SKH for a clinical appointment.

Since its launch, the Programme has completed 125 consultations on a wide range of clinical conditions in children aged 3 months to 19 years from Trinidad & Tobago and other Caribbean islands. The benefits of this programme include cost saving on foreign travel and accommodation expenses (average total cost TT$26,300 per consultation), short waiting time for appointments with overseas consultants, increased local access to one-onone high quality specialist consultations and the opportunity for needy patients to receive treatment abroad. Cost saving in consultations is approximately TT$3.28 million with an additional savings of approximately TT$4.4 million for surgical procedures, not available in Trinidad, conducted at SKH.

UWI Telehealth Programme, Child Health Unit, Building 69, 3rd Floor, Children’s Hospital, Eric William Medical Sciences Programme. E-mail: uwitelehealth@sta.uwi.edu, Tel/Fax: 868-663-1610, Website: http://sta.uwi.edu/telehealth/