In an increasingly mobile world, many citizens and professionals are frequent travellers. Access during unplanned care to their patient summary, their most essential health information in a form physicians in another country can understand can impact not only their safety, but also the quality and effectiveness of care. International health information technology (HIT) standards such as HL7 CDA...

The revolution started without anybody realising it. The finding, by the Court of Justice of the European Union (the Court), that two Italian nationals, Mrs Luisi and Mr Carbone, were entitled to travel to another member state to receive health services – unrestrained by capital movement or other restrictions – hardly alarmed people in the health sector: Luisi and Carbone were over-the-border s...

Background & aim: Healthcare areas, especially fertility care (commonly accompanied with high emotions, as well as long-term and recurring treatment periods) could exclusively benefit from patient-centered care (PCC). Despite evident advantages of PCC, this approach has not been practiced as a routine procedure in current clinical environments yet, even in western developed countries. Therefore...

There are many issues of concern regarding the legal and ethical aspects of telemedicine. These include the responsibilities and potential liabilities of the health professional, the duty to maintain the confidentiality and privacy of patient records, and the jurisdictional problems associated with cross-border consultations. There is also the issue of reimbursement for care provided using a te...

background and objectives: the increasing pressure on health systems to improve quality of health care,require them to develop novel conceptual framework and indices aimed at evaluating decision variables in the contemporary complex community. customer quality is a newly introduced concept addressing capability of patients in contribution to healthcare process and cooperation with healthcare pr...

Background: Concurrent Chemotherapy and Radiotherapy (RT) is considered as standard of care in advanced carcinoma cervix. The superior border of radiation portal is kept at L4-L5 junction to cover common iliac group of lymph nodes which lie along common iliac vessels. Methods: Level of aortic bifurcation in to two common iliacs was retrospectively evaluated in 90 patients of carcinoma cervix to...

When I visit my dentist I travel 4 kilometres from my residence to her office. My experience is commonplace; many Canadians commute from their homes or workplaces to see a nearby dentist. Although our coffee might come from Colombia and our clothes from China, for most of us dental care is as local as the neighbourhood grocery store, library or community centre. However, for some people, obtain...

OBJECTIVE To assess and monitor the quality of care provided to Hispanics diagnosed with diabetes living in the border region between the United States of America and Mexico. METHODS From April 2001 to November 2002, Phase I of the U.S.-Mexico Border Diabetes Prevention and Control Project, a prevalence study of type 2 diabetes and its risk factors, was conducted along the U.S.-Mexico border ...