6th ESACP Congress, Heidelberg, April 7-11, 1999

A137
TELEPATHOLOGY - TOOL OR TOY?
Tucker J, Duvall E, McGoogan E, Bird C

Pathology Dept, Edinburgh University, UK

Telepathology has not altered the day-to-day working practice of most pathologists in Europe. Although telepathology performance is limited by factors such as equipment expense and complexity, lack of user-friendliness and poor inter-operability, the most serious problem is the lack of perceived need for telepathology. Most pathologists do not feel that the available telepathology facilities can improve their service to patients. Recently the Internet has widened the range of services available under the guise of telepathology . Many large servers devoted specifically to pathology services are available both in the USA and more recently in Europe (e.g. EUROPATH). These offer not only current pathology news, information, and links; but also such services as remote consultation, remote quantitation, continuing medical education, accreditation, and image data bases for diagnostic assistance. Thus the Internet forms a valuable resource for more and more practising pathologists. Meanwhile, performance is rising and costs are falling for both equipment and communications. Also, the practice of pathology is changing. There is increasing interest in many of the services contributing to quality assurance that can be offered by telepathology. The number of pathologists now investigating or using telepathology is increasing dramatically. It is therefore vital the pathologists assist researchers, developers and manufacturers to develop tools that make the most cost-effective use of the available technological resources.