Preface

Telehealth allows clinicians to care for patients at a distance via electronic information technologies. The term covers clinical and non-clinical services, including monitoring, diagnosis, and treatment, as well as delivery of preventative care and health promotion. Telemedicine is a more common term which describes remote clinical services.

The major impact of COVID-19 has caused telemedicine to become mainstream since the end of 2019. Clinicians are having to use tele-consultation, tele-monitoring, telepharmacy, tele-rehabilitation, tele-surgery and other remote methods and technologies to assess and treat patients. We now have an opportunity to re-assess whether existing telemedicine is sufficient to meet higher-level medical needs in theory and practice.

The patient-centric model of care means that information and interaction originate from the patient. Personalized data generated by various monitoring technologies are jointly managed by patients and medical staff. Medical staff will supervise artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms to understand the patient's specific condition and provide the best decision-making and treatment, moving us ever closer to the ideal of precision medicine.

This book incorporates new developments as well as future prospects in the everexpanding field of telehealth and telemedicine. It will be a resource for medical staff (physicians, surgeons, family doctors, ENT doctors, audiologists, psychologists, registered nurses, technologists), specialists in sleep medicine, social workers, public health practitioners, researchers in basic medicine, experts in science, students, and even patients themselves.

I would like to thank all the authors who have dedicated their time and expertise to this book, as well as everyone who has contributed to the editorial process, including the author service manager, the publishing process manager, the commissioning editor, and the technical editor. Their efforts have resulted in a successful academic work. Finally, I am grateful as ever to everyone who has been part of my own journey, including my family, teachers and colleagues.

#### **Tang-Chuan Wang (Vincent Wang)**

Chairman of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery, China Medical University Hsinchu Hospital, Taiwan

> School of Medicine, College of Medicine, China Medical University, Taiwan

Department of Biomedical Engineering, College of Biomedical Engineering, China Medical University, Taiwan

Research Scholar of Harvard Medical School, MA, USA

Research Scholar of University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics, IA, USA

Member of American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery

Fellow of the American College of Surgeons

## Section 1
