Story and images by Medicalxpress
To ease isolation during extended hospitalizations, UC Davis Children’s Hospital offers secure videoconferencing for patients and families. While anecdotal accounts have suggested the Family-Link program enhances quality of life during long hospital stays, clinicians wondered if the technology also offered clinical benefits.
To answer that, a team led by UC Davis professor James Marcin studied 367 children who were hospitalized for at least four days. They found that access to Family-Link significantly reduced patient stress. The study was published in the journal Pediatrics.
As the popularity of applications like Skype and FaceTime have increased, so has the number of patients interested in using these applications to communicate with family and friends. UC Davis Children’s Hospital pioneered the Family-Link program, which provides patients with laptops, webcams and secure internet connections.
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