For more than a decade, Jun Chung-hwa took a ferry from a small island every month to see her doctor on the mainland to check her blood pressure and get medicine.

It was a hassle as the trip took the 69-year-old away from her daily job of digging up clams in a mud flat on the picturesque island off the country's western coast.


She also complained that fog and winds often prevented her from returning to Godae Island.

Jun doesn't worry about making monthly trips anymore as she can consult with her doctor through video conferencing under a pilot telemedicine program.

Telemedicine is designed to provide quality health care to those in hard-to-reach areas and for the elderly by connecting patients to doctors using the Internet in one of the world's most wired countries.

Last year, South Korea increased the number of people in its telemedicine pilot program to about 5,300 on seven remote islands as well as prison inmates, deep-sea fishermen and soldiers near the border with North Korea to check the feasibility of the system before expanding it across the country, according to the Ministry of Health and Welfare.

"It is very convenient. I don't have to take a ferry to check my blood pressure each month," Jun said after toiling for hours in the hot weather to dig up clams in a mud flat near her home.

Jun said she now checks her blood pressure twice a week at her fishing village's small public health clinic, where her health data is automatically sent to the health care center in Boryeong, a city about 190 kilometers southwest of Seoul, for monitoring.

The government has doled out blood pressure monitors and devices meant to check blood sugar levels to those who participated in the pilot program free of charge.

Jun is among 17 elderly -- six men and 11 women who have high blood pressure and diabetes -- who are registered with the pilot program. The island is home to about 150 people, mostly in their 60s and 70s.

Two doctors at the Boryeong Healthcare Center monitor the health conditions of their patients and meet them through a computer screen once a month and write prescriptions if needed.

The 17 people get their medicine delivered to their doorsteps free of charge under the pilot program.

"I think telemedicine works as it saves time and money for people on the island," said Kim Hyung-gon, head of Boryeong Healthcare Center.

Shin In-sook, the only nurse who has been heading the small community clinic on Godae Island for nine years, said the pilot program has made a big difference for people on the island, noting people regularly come to the clinic to check their blood pressure and send the data to doctors on the mainland.

"People thought telemedicine is something that is bothersome, but now they recognize it as a must, and some of them even check their blood sugar levels in the middle of night," Shin said.

Park Seok-gum, a 67-year-old resident, said she checks her blood sugar level when she wakes up in the middle of the night or when she cannot fall asleep, a change brought about by telemedicine.

She also said telemedicine is good for her as she can monitor her high blood pressure and diabetes without having to take a ferry to the mainland.

Telemedicine also turned out to be effective for the timely treatment for soldiers in front-line units.

A corporal, identified only by his family name Cho, narrowly avoided losing his eyesight when a cutter blade broke off and hit his left eye while he was working near the border with North Korea in January.

An Army doctor instructed Cho on how to apply first-aid treatment through telemedicine. He was later taken by helicopter to a military hospital in Bundang, south of Seoul.

A survey of 2,700 soldiers in March found that 90 percent said they were satisfied with telemedicine, according to the Defense Ministry.

The ministry began a telemedicine pilot program for 40 units in remote areas last year so that they can see Army doctors anytime. It plans to raise the number of units that can receive telemedicine to 76 units by 2017.

South Korea hopes that its pilot program will generate a public consensus for expanding telemedicine for all of its 51 million people and eventually export its system of telemedicine to Latin America and other countries that suffer from doctor shortages, mostly in remote areas.

South Korea sees telemedicine as one of the promising areas for economic growth, with the global telemedicine market expected to grow to US$4.5 billion in 2018.

South Korea was one of the poorest countries with a crumbling medical infrastructure decades ago, but now it boasts one of the world's most advanced medical systems.

President Park Geun-hye has made sales pitches for South Korea's telemedicine program during her overseas trips in recent years.

In April, South Korea and Mexico signed a memorandum of understanding on telemedicine during Park's visit to Mexico City.

Mexico, slightly less than three times the size of Texas, is interested in telemedicine as it suffers from doctor shortages.

Last year, she also toured Colombia, Peru, Chile and Brazil during which South Korea inked similar initial deals on telemedicine.

The same year, Seoul's St. Mary's Hospital signed a deal with Ruijin Hospital, a general hospital in China's commercial hub of Shanghai, to pursue a project in telemedicine.

Still, Park has been facing an uphill battle from doctors over telemedicine.

A bill calling for telemedicine was automatically scrapped in May, when the term of the previous legislature expired.

Last week, the government submitted a new bill to the new National Assembly that calls for, among other things, telemedicine for those who have diabetes and high blood pressure, people on remote islands, the elderly, people with disabilities, prison inmates and soldiers.

The bill "is meant to address the blind spot of health care and enhance public convenience and promote the development of the medical industry," the government said in the bill posted on parliament's website.

The Korean Medical Association, which speaks for about 100,000 physicians across the country, has voiced its opposition to the government's move to expand the pilot program across the country.

"We are against the telemedicine mainly because there is the risk of misdiagnosis," said Kim Ju-hyun, a surgeon who serves as spokesman for the association.

The Ministry of Health and Welfare, which oversees the pilot program, said no misdiagnoses have occurred during the ongoing pilot program.

The ministry also said the bill would keep big hospitals from providing telemedicine to ordinary patients except for soldiers or prison inmates.

The proposed ban is an apparent move to allay concerns among some doctors that telemedicine could lead to the collapse of small neighborhood clinics as many South Koreans favor big hospitals over small ones.

Still, people like Jun said the benefits of telemedicine far outweigh the potential risks of misdiagnoses.

Kim Yang-geun, a 58-year-old fisherman on Godae Island who has been suffering from diabetes, said he has been receiving a lot of help from telemedicine, something he had never imagined.

"Seeing my doctor over the Internet makes no difference to seeing him in person," Kim said. "The most convenient thing in telemedicine is that I don't have to travel to the mainland for check-ups and to get medicine." (Yonhap)