Good Samaritan Hospital Offers Telehealth Connection for New Parents

Today's technology has come to Good Samaritan Hospital's Family Birth Center, Kearney, Nebraska through Telehealth. Telehealth is a long-distance connection that unites new parents with family, such as grandparents and aunts and uncles, who are not able to be present to welcome the new baby.

I think back to all the times I haven't been able to go places because I've been in recovery from one surgery or another to keep me walking. While, thankfully, those surgeries never took place during the births of my three grandchildren, what a difference a Telehealth connection would have made for me had I been unable to travel very far and unable to meet a grandchild for the first time in person.

Telehealth equipment is like teleconferencing using live audio feed and two-way video. The feed uses telephone lines rather than Internet so is completely secure for the families involved. The new parents at Good Samaritan Hospital in Kearney, Nebraska can talk to family using the Telehealth equipment and show off their precious new little baby. All parties can interact in real time using the Telehealth conferencing. It is a "virtual" visit with the new baby at Good Samaritan Hospital.

Some of Good Samaritan's Telehealth units can be wheeled right into the room for an up close and personal visit. Family unable to travel to Good Samaritan Hospital, can go to the nearest hospital or health department with Telehealth capabilities and be hooked in real time to see the new parents and baby.

Both of our children were born at Good Samaritan Hospital, but that was long before anything like Telehealth was probably even conceived. How nice it would have been for my father, who lived in northern Minnesota, to have seen his grandchildren soon after birth, or my sister in Kansas.

There are now 100 Telehealth sites around Nebraska. Good Samaritan Hospital Telehealth has also been able to connect to several other states. Most touching was a dad in Iraq who was able, through Good Samaritan Hospital and Telehealth Services, to watch the birth of his son.

Good Samaritan Hospital was established in 1924 by the Sisters of Saint Francis and is now a member of Catholic Health Initiatives. Located in Kearney, Nebraska, the center of the state, Good Samaritan Hospital provides top quality care (I've had most of my many surgeries at Good Samaritan Hospital) for the residents of central and western Nebraska as well as northern Kansas.

In 1995, Good Samaritan Hospital created Mid-Nebraska Telemedicine Network. The goal was and is to improve health care to the many rural Nebraska and Kansas areas. Besides introducing family members to the new baby, the Good Samaritan Telehealth system is used for meetings, doctor appointments and consultations as well as used with a direct feed into emergency.

Using Good Samaritan Hospital Telehealth for new parents to show off baby to family who cannot travel to Kearney, is simply a matter of requesting the service, which is free to new parents.

What an exciting service for baby, new parents, families who don't live nearby and Good Samaritan Hospital.