Remote health unit. Photo courtesy Government of Saskatchewan.
Another northern Saskatchewan community will be employing the use of robots to provide state of the art healthcare for remote residents.
The provincial government will spend $500,000 to equip the community of Stony Rapids with what is known as remote presence technology.
It allows patients to access medical experts from their home community, providing real-time assessments, diagnostics and patient management by connecting doctors to patients through a mobile robot or a smaller portable handheld device.
La Loche received the same technology earlier this year. It is currently being used for pediatric emergency assessments, but its role is expected to be expanded.
The remote presence technology was pioneered by Dr. Ivar Mendez, who is head of the department of surgery at the University of Saskatchewan. The technology was first used in Saskatchewan in Pelican Narrows in 2014.