FCC boosts rural healthcare with $400m net subsidies (and BYU HBLL)

By Richi Jennings. July 16, 2010.

The Federal Communications Commission has announced a plan to subsidize broadband Internet connectivity for rural healthcare organizations. The idea is to kickstart innovative Internet uses to improve patient care out in the boonies. In IT Blogwatch, bloggers connect the dots.

Your humble blogwatcher selected these bloggy morsels for your enjoyment. Not to mention Study like a scholar, scholar, at BYU's HBLL...
 
 
Cecilia Kang deciphers the fours and zeros:

[The FCC will] create a $400 million program [to] bring broadband connections to rural healthcare providers. ... [It will] increase the portion of health provider service costs it subsidizes to 50 percent ... would also pay for 85 percent of ... new or upgraded broadband networks to areas that have poor infrastructure.
...
The FCC would also ... increase the number of eligible rural health care providers to roughly 12,000 from about 9,800 entities today. ... The FCC ... recommends making high-speed Internet service an underlying platform for transferring information between health care providers, patients and hospitals. ... [It] could increase the adoption of new services such as real-time video streaming of ... procedures and patient visits.

Stacey Higginbotham adds:

The program will pay for both building out better connections as well the monthly costs. ... A more limited program that’s been in place for years hasn’t had many takers ... once the connections were in place, it was still expensive to pay for the access.
...
Given the overall push for online medical records ... this program could prove both beneficial to people who live in rural areas, and ... [to] companies in the IT sector that want to see telemedicine expand.

Sara Jerome has the background:

For thousands of providers, bandwidth remains a major barrier to adopting the most advanced health technologies. ... [It's] worst in isolated, rural areas. ... The FCC ... pinpointed 3,600 facilities where connectivity issues had stymied the use of advanced health technologies.
...
Rural health providers often require costly infrastructure upgrades before they can transmit digital images and ... medical records, hold ... video consultations for remote diagnosis ... and eventually even explore such promising fields as remote surgery. ... The FCC thinks the fund ... could save the health care sector $700 billion in the next 15 to 25 years.

Matthew Lasar explains that it's not exactly new money:

At present, the program ... caps its services at $400 million allocated a year. ... Historically, the ... program has been "underutilized." ... That means that it hasn't spent much of the money the program annually allocates itself (we wish the same could be said for the USF's high-cost fund, which underwrites rural telcos).
...
So the plan is to keep the $400 million cap, even with this expansion, but to top off the infrastructure program at $100 million, and to put other cost and accountability controls into the windfall.

But h3nrch isn't at all happy:

Makes me wonder how this impacts market innovation. What's the incentive to innovate if the existing model is subsidized ... and is this approach really sustainable?

To which, mausium responds:

That there is no market innovation in rural areas is the problem. It's the same reason why there are some areas that the USPS is required to deliver to ... there's just no money in it.

And Finally...
The Old Spice dude, successfully parodied by Brigham Young University's Harold B. Lee Library
[hat tip: Randy Cassingham]
 
 
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Richi Jennings is an independent analyst/consultant, specializing in blogging, email, and security. A cross-functional IT geek since 1985, you can follow him as @richi on Twitter, pretend to be richij's friend on Facebook, or just use good old email: itbw@richij.com.

You can also read Richi's full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.