UWI Conducts First Telemedicine Broadcast Across Three Campuses

The first telemedicine broadcast by the University of the West Indies, UWI, using the region's only dedicated research and education network, CaribNet, was conducted on Wednesday November 6, 2013. The telecast originated from the Hugh Wynter Fertility Management Unit (HWFMU) at the Mona Campus and was broadcast to medical students and faculty at the Open Campus sites in Trinidad & Tobago and Barbados. The HWFMU has been a hub for the promotion and advancement of Sexual and Reproductive Health (S&RH) for the past 30 years.
 
Professor E. Nigel Harris, Vice Chancellor of the University of the West Indies, noted that "this is a very special occasion for the UWI as it brings us closer to the vision of a university linked virtually... a seamless environment powered by technology, allowing students around the region to have access to the best teaching and learning resources from all campuses."
 
Mr. Ken Sylvester, CEO of the Caribbean Knowledge and Learning Network, CKLN, said that among the benefits of CaribNet is its ability to enable much greater teaching and learning possibilities throughout the region and to reach the thousands of students that matriculate annually but are not afforded tertiary education due to lack of space.
 
 According to Professor Joseph Frederick, Director of the HWFMU, with an ever increasing intake of students to the respective medical faculties, the Unit needs to not only identify new ways of delivering their programmes to students but must also contribute to standardising medical training in the region.
 
The HWFMU programme has expanded to involve the building of two "state of the art" operating rooms, a skills laboratory, an assisted conception laboratory and the introduction of a telemedicine programme to standardise teaching of Minimally Access Surgery throughout the Caribbean. Prof. Frederick noted that while the Unit has the human capacity to deliver the skills training regionally, they needed infrastructure to deliver this, and so was very pleased to be able to be among the first to use CaribNet for this purpose.
 
The telecast included presentations on cutting edge services and technological features at the HWFMU. Dr. Loxley Christie, Research Fellow at the HWFMU introduced the recently enhanced integrated operating theatre at the HWFMU, making it the only medical facility so configured in the English-speaking Caribbean. He further presented on minimal access surgery.
 
 
Real time demonstrations of minimal access surgery were shared across CaribNet to the  UWI Open Campus sites at Cave Hill, (Barbados) and St. Augustine (Trinidad & Tobago)
 
 
Two live procedures were performed on a patient for the audiences at the three campus sites in high definition across the network. One was a hysteroscopic evaluation of the uterine cavity and the other, a demonstration of pelvic anatomy, by Dr. Sharifa Frederick, Research Fellow and Dr. Vernon DaCosta, Consultant, respectively.
 
Dr. Pansy Hamilton, Assistant Director of the HWFMU presented on the non-clinical, sexual and reproductive health issues which encompass matters of human sexuality, sexual rights, sexual health, reproductive rights and reproductive health which are of concern to both males and females in the region.  Dr. John Harriott, Consultant, gave an enlightening presentation on robotic assisted laparoscopic surgery, one of the technologies the HWFMU intends to utilise moving forward. 
 
Medical students, as well as faculty and representatives from the national research and education networks in Trinidad and Tobago (TTRENT), Barbados (BARNet) and Jamaica (JREN) were all very impressed with the telecast and were "blown away by the capabilities of the technology and what is happening at the Hugh Wynter Fertility management Unit at Mona." For many of the students, this was the first time that they were seeing a demonstration of minimally invasive surgery. They felt it was a very positive initiative, and saw the demonstration of the HWFMU Skills Lab as an excellent training tool for students.
 
Using the technological advances within the HWFMU and the UWI's access to CaribNet's high bandwidth as a dedicated research and education network, numerous clinical, research, teaching, learning and collaborative possibilities open up for the Unit and the University.
 
The Caribbean Knowledge and Learning Network (CKLN) is an inter-governmental agency of the Caribbean Community, CARICOM, with responsibility for the development and management of the high capacity, broadband fiber optic network called CaribNet, connecting all CARICOM member states.
 
In practice globally, research and education networks interconnect a country's higher education institutions plus government, research institutions, primary and secondary schools, libraries, hospitals, museums and other public institutions and are considered part of the "public good".