Full Length Research Article THE CURRENT CONDITION AND FUTURE DEVELOPMENT OF TELEMEDICINE : SYSTEMATIC REVIEW

Objectives: T o understand the application condition of telemedicine and discuss its future development strategy. Methods: A systematic search was undertaken for current application condition of telemedicine . Telemedicine, ehealth and telehealth were used as searching terms to retrieved follow three databases from their establishment to the end of June 2013: PubMed, C ochrane L ibrary , Google Scholar. Studies on patients and consumers, health professionals and family caregivers were involved. Studies such as overview, expert advice, lectur es, announcements, conference presentations, project introductions were excluded . Results: 140 studies met the inclusion criteria which included 86 systematic reviews, 44 literature reviews, 1 evidence - based analysis, 1 original research, 2 evaluation and appraisal system reviews and 6 other types of studies. 18 studies are about mental health, 14 are endocrine gland, 13 are radiology, 12 are burns treatment, 8 are chronic disease and so on. Telemedicine application types can be divided into the following four types: telemonitor, teleconsultation, telereference, teletherapy. Conclusion: Telemedicine has obtained great progress development, which could be developed better if following suggesti ons: more evidence on cost effectiveness of telemedicine in the level of policy are needed , a compromising attitudes to the telemedicine is needed in its initial stage , and telemedicine should be encouraged to be applied in disease prevention and health co nsultation .