MARIA ZOLFO

Telemedicine is a way to support health care delivery in remote areas. With this telemedicine project the Institute of Tropical Medicine, Antwerp (ITMA), intended to facilitate the introduction of antiretroviral therapy (ART) for patients affected by Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) and Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) in developing countries, providing training, distance support and education to healthcare workers located in those settings. In 4 years experience the ITMA Telemedicine service received 642 teleconsultations, from more than 35 resource-constrained countries. We believe that by giving to clinicians the opportunity to access support and clinical mentoring it is possible to lower the threshold for launching ART programs and impact the speed of the scaling up access to antiretrovirals in developing countries. KEY WORDS: Telemedicine, HIV/AIDS, antiretroviral therapy, low resource settings, developing countries, health care workers.