Ethics of Telemedicine

There are many ethical issues that must be considered when using telemedicine

Authentication

Generally speaking, the information of the telemedicine is available to many doctors all around the world. Therefore, the doctors must be authentic or authorized in the area of telemedicine in order to practice this. In other words, the doctors must be have the right ability to treat the patients. For example, the doctors may be required to have liscence in order to do telemedicine in a certain area- this is one way to authenticate the doctor. The patients will not desire to do telemedicine if they do not know whether the doctor is a true doctor or not.

Relationship between doctor and patient

There must be a pleasant relationship between the doctor and the patient. To do this, the doctor must respect the patient and the patient must respect the doctor as well. In addition, confidentiallity must be maintained with in the doctor and the patient regarding to privacy, personal information. In this way, there will be reliablility and trust between the doctor and the patient, which will lead to a pleasant relationship.

Responsibility of the doctor

The doctor must be responsible to his advice and decision that he/she gives to the patient. In this way, the patients can trust the doctor and there will be no worries in them. In addition, because telemedicine is regarding to the health of the patient, it is essential for the doctors to give suitable advices.

Security and privacy

The data of the patients must be secure. There may be hackers who intend to steal the data. However, these data must be safe because it may lead to other issues such as privacy. If the data is stolen, the privacy of the patient will be lost.
The doctors must be aware of these issues. In addition, if this telemedicine requires monitoring of the patient, this will also lead to the loss of privacy which is sometimes undesirable for patients.

This information is based on this ariticle:
http://www.laakariliitto.fi/e/ethics/telemed.htmlThis website talks about many other issues aroused in telemedicine:
http://telemed.org/legal/