Telepsychiatry for Inpatient Consultations at a Separate Campus of an Academic Medical Center

Abstract

Background: Many hospitals do not have regular access to psychiatry consult services. This is well understood as a common shortage at nonacademic community hospitals (especially in rural environments, and may also be a problem at noncontiguously located smaller hospitals that are affiliated with academic medical centers in urban settings. The authors sought to deliver timely inpatient psychiatric consultation–liaison services via telemedicine to a local but physically separated hospital affiliated with an academic medical center. Materials and Methods: The authors collaborated with an office dedicated to the advancement of telemedicine technology at their academic medical center. They developed a telemedicine-based care model to deliver inpatient consultation–liaison psychiatry consultations to an affiliated (but physically separate) small academic hospital that did not have its own on-site consultation–liaison psychiatry team. Results: The authors were able to successfully complete 30 consultations, each within 24 h. Only 1 patient was ultimately unwilling to participate in the telemedicine interview. As consultations were accomplished on same day as request, patient length of stay was unaffected. Conclusions: This pilot study suggests that telemedicine is a viable model for inpatient consultation–liaison psychiatry services to hospitals without on-site psychiatry resources and represents a viable alternative model of service delivery.