One of the very important sectors of society that broadband is helping to improve is health care.  With firm evidence of the progress that broadband-enabled telemedicine applications provide in treatment, costs, and overall efficiency, the FCC is charging forward with their rural telemedicine plan.  NPR’s All Things Considered took note with a feature yesterday walking listeners (and readers) through examples of the opportunities broadband powers in rural health care.

Two afternoons a week, Dr. Alison Semrad, an endocrinologist, sits at a desk and consults with patients over a broadband video conference.

In a recent conference, Laura McKewan sat in a chair in front of a camera at a clinic 300 miles away in Eureka. She has Addison’s disease, a rare condition that affects the adrenal glands. McKewan would have to drive six hours to San Francisco to see an endocrinologist, so she jumped at the chance to consult with Semrad.

This comes on the heels of FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski’s recent trip to a Seattle Children’s Hospital for a demonstration of their video conferencing system, which is improving their patient care.  Of course, this is just the beginning.  As facilities and patients adopt broadband at greater rates, more people in rural areas will be able to embrace video conferencing as a standard part of their health care.  In fact, the vice president of information systems of Kadlec, the company that demonstrated at this event, predicts that eventually “they’re going to become as commonplace as telephones.” Read more: http://www.thenewstribune.com/2010/08/14/1301149/kadlec-talks-to-specialists-via.html#ixzz0wyUELyfm

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Jonathan S. Adelstein, Administrator of the USDA’s Rural Utilities Service, was today’s keynote at the Broadband Breakfast on “Challenges to Rural Broadband Availability and Adoption.”  Adelstein first acknowledged the tremendous support he is experiencing given that broadband is a top agenda item at the White House and the FCC, but then went on to discuss some of the challenges with rural broadband that his agency is seeking to address.  Of course, the cost of deployment is higher, but he finds this challenge is exacerbated by lower revenue potential due to lower adoption rates in rural areas.  Some of the reasons that Adelstein cited for lower broadband adoption in rural communities include digital literacy challenges, lack of working computers in homes, and an aging population.  The rural broadband expert panelists after his keynote suggested solutions such as working with local governments, targeting support to unserved areas, and driving demand through digital literacy programs.

Adelstein is seeing broadband success with the funds invested from the Recovery Act.  He not only seeks to build further off that success with programs to help communities leverage their broadband progress, but also looks forward to the second round of investments which will be more than double the first round (a strategy so RUS could learn from the first round and improve).  As Adelstein noted, rural communities are actually some of those most in need of fast, reliable broadband for services like telemedicine and distance learning.

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The Broadband Properties Summit introduced a new partner this year, the Rural Telecommunications Congress (RTC), to host a one-day forum alongside the main conference focusing on rural community opportunities and challenges.  The RTC track presented over 24 speakers with rural expertise, including Director of Deployment for the Omnibus Broadband Initiative at the FCC, Rob Curtis.  Speakers addressed important topics like the benefits of broadband access in rural communities, how to successfully bring broadband into rural communities, and once it’s there, how to maximize the use of it, both individually and institutionally.

One theme that ran throughout the discussions was that of economic opportunity.  Brent Legg of Connected Nation pointed out that broadband doesn’t get a lot of attention in communities where technology is a topic of discussion. He suggests making it a tangible issue by asking “What do you want to accomplish in the next 25 years?”  Generally, he finds, the answer revolves around economic development.

Greg Laudeman, President of the RTC and longtime manager of programs to facilitate the adoption of broadband technologies, shared his advice on bringing broadband to rural communities, noting that many rural community leaders “think broadband is for someone else, by someone else. “ He suggests looking at organizations that really embrace it, to demonstrate the fundamental differences of those really maximizing technology.  And then how do you get local leaders on board?  Laudeman suggests 1) Demonstrate success of other like communities and 2) Do training on the technology and what it will do.

NextGenWeb caught up with several speakers from the RTC track.  Watch the interviews below to see how Jane Patterson, RTC Director and Executive Director of the e-NC Authority, Greg Laudeman, President of the RTC, Brent Legg, VP of State and Local Initiatives for Connected Nation, and Harry Roesch, RTC Board Member, are all facilitating broadband access and use in rural areas!

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