This evening (all going well) I will participate in the Twitter #irishmed discussion, which is on telemedicine.

On one level, telemedicine does not apply all that much to me in the clinical area of psychiatry. It seems most appropriate for more data-driven specialties, or ones which have a much greater role for interpreting (and conveying the results of!) lab tests. Having said that, in the full sense of the term telemedicine does not just refer to video consultations but to any remote medical interaction. I spend a lot of time on the phone.

I do have a nagging worry about the loss of the richness of the clinical encounter in telemedicine. I am looking forward to having some interesting discussions on this this evening. I do worry that this is an area in which the technology can drive the process to a degree that may crowd out the clinical need.

George Bernard Shaw said ‘The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place’. This same quote was used by Tim Fargo in his foreword to my book ‘Mug and Tweet’ and has been used by communicators over the decades, to question the effectiveness of our communication. I work alongside Steve Maraboli, who is in my opinion one of the greatest Human Behaviour specialists ever, and he always asks that we observe the behaviour of others and more importantly our own behaviour. The real question that needs to be asked by ourselves, of ourselves is: What were we thinking that caused us to say and do what we did? Did our actions communicate effectively? More importantly what was our attitude towards the people we were communicating with, did we take into account what John Maxwell has always said ‘People don’t care how much you know, until they know…