一種遠程重癥監護系統允許醫院設計高質量的操作有效以及經濟的“廣系統”重癥監護方案。

盡管重癥監護室患者需要24小時特殊監護，但是大多數重癥監護室缺乏專門訓練的醫生或者重癥監護專家來完成這項任務。在美國有重癥監護人員的儲備，但是只有6000人不到有實際操作經驗。而通過遠程醫學和計算機監測器連接到重癥監護室的醫療設施，新系統能夠提過所需的監護。這種設施配備重癥監護專家領導的小組，能夠監測與護理數以百計的患者，就象空中交通管制系統能夠監測數以百計的飛機一樣。該系統叫做eICU，能夠提供持續監測，使得醫生能夠緊急處理；并且幫助醫生獲得正確處理患者的信息，從而使得他們工作更加迅速。

eICU系統是由Visicu公司研制開發的，該公司是約翰霍普金斯醫院兩位重癥監護專家于1998年創辦的。該公司為那些打算提高ICU系統質量的大型多醫院保健系統服務，這些機構使用eICU系統對患者進行實時音頻和視頻監測。

Kaleida保健系統cICU操作主任Colleen Dowd指出：“這項技術并不意味著可以代替醫生的實際操作以及床邊護理，但是為處于緊急事件的患者提供安全網絡來支持現場的醫生，這將提高患者的醫療護理質量。”

Enhanced Intensive Care System
 
A remote intensive care system allows hospitals to create a system-wide critical care program designed to improve quality, operating efficiency, and economic performance.

Although patients in an intensive care unit (ICU) require round-the-clock specialized care, most ICUs do not have specially trained doctors, or intensivists, available to do this. There is a shortage of intensivists in the United States, where there are fewer than 6,000 actively practicing. With a remote facility linked via telemedicine and computer monitors to hospital ICU rooms, the new system can provide the required care. The facility is staffed with an intensivist-led team that can monitor and care for hundreds of patients much like air traffic controllers monitor hundreds of planes. Called eICU, the system provides constant surveillance, provides the patient with immediate physician access, and arms the physician with the patient information needed to make the right decisions and make them quickly.

The eICU system was developed by Visicu, Inc. (Baltimore, MD, USA), a company founded in 1998 by two intensivist doctors from Johns Hopkins Medicine (also in Baltimore). The company markets the system to large, multi-hospital healthcare systems that want to improve the quality of their ICU care. One such system is Kaleida Health (Buffalo, NY, USA), which uses the eICU system for real-time audio and video monitoring of patients in the ICU units of two suburban hospitals.

“This technology is not meant to replace the human touch or bedside care, but supports the onsite clinicians by offering a safety net to patients in the event of an emergency,” noted Colleen Dowd, director of cICU operations at Kaleida Health. “The result will be improved patient care.”