TITLE:
Ethical and Legal Arguments about Telemedicine in Colombia
AUTHORS:
José Antonio García Pereáñez
KEYWORDS:
Medical Act, Ethical-Legal, Cyberculture, Digital Subject, Telemedicine
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Computer and Communications,
Vol.5 No.3,
March
13,
2017
ABSTRACT: This paper makes a reflection of humanistic approach about telemedicine in the cyber culture context, including a debate on the “digital era” and the nature of human communication. It is aimed at interpreting the influence of the technological era in the communication between the emitting subjects and receptors that emerge from communicative relations in telemedicine. This is the result of the analysis on legitimacy and legality of Communication for Health among individuals interacting in the cyberspace, mediated and conceived by modern technologies such as computer science, telematics and cybernetics. Telemedicine, according to ethical and legal proposals, can be subject of criticism because of the displacement of the medical doctor-patient relationship. Bigger distance and asymmetries in the medical act are established, being exposed to the inter-subjective relations of the cyberspace that immerses the patient into a deeper vulnerability, mediated by the technology that overflows him. A literature review through the empirical-analytical method, aimed at describing the impact of telemedicine in users, was done. This technology of recent use in Colombia promises to become a tool to support the solution of some health problems. Its development must be linked to the use of regulations that involve the “must be”, and its application must be decided according to legal principles that take on responsibility on medical doctors and technicians. The inevitable development of medical technology and its application in telemedicine may lead to the vulnerability of ethical principles, and consequently, the harm and misinterpretation of the medical act.