Tromsø Telemedicine and eHealth Conference 2006:

Everyone wants development - no one wants change

According to the futurist, we are all frightened by images in which the boundaries between the human body and technology are erased, and humans emerge as aliens. But Hoppe believes that when we face a real choice, and modern technology offers us the opportunity to continue living or functioning as we did before, we will choose the technology.

  -As soon as it benefits me, I will want it, the experienced futurist believes.

Opportunities of the future
Historically, both experts and politicians have had problems in seeing which opportunities the future offered.

  -The patent for the mobile telephone dates back to 1912. A melon farmer in Florida obtained the rights. Then there was the IBM engineer who, in 1962, could not imagine what in the world a microchip could be used for, Hoppe adds.

The driving forces
As the driving forces for the development in electronics and technology, she highlights the following factors:
  -The cost of electronics is falling steadily
  -Computer storage capacity is exploding

Nanotechnology
And if the experienced futurist is to be believed, the major new vogue sweeping the world will be nanotechnology.

  -We use it already, and strictly speaking it can be used for anything. We have already used this technology to produce odour-free socks. Soon we will be able to fit health staff with antibacterial clothes and clothes that regulate the body temperature. There are unimagined opportunities, she asserts.

The public health service is reluctant
On the subject of the public health service's reluctance to introduce eHealth on a large scale, Hoppe offers the following explanation:

  -Of all the challenges in eHealth, 80 per cent does not concern technology, but social and psychological issues. It relates to organization, power relationships, the division of responsibilities between health staff and the decentralization of services, says Hoppe.

  -A common comment from the public health service is: "Yes, it is a very interesting concept, but it will not work for us.

According to Hoppe, what people fear is not changes, but the loss of the assets and benefits they have in the present.

  -Everyone wants development; no one wants change. This is the paradoxical reality we face, when at the same time we know that change is the only constant we have, she concludes.

The futurist Marie-Therese Hoppe from Denmark opened the eHealth conference in Tromsø with a riveting presentation about the technological future and the changes we can expect in the coming years.
Photo: Jarl-Stian Olsen, Norwegian Centre for Telemedicine

Quotes from Marie-Therese Hoppe:
  -eHealth is one of the most important forces driving positive changes within the public health service.
  -In the future, eHealth will be just as common and available to everyone as today's MP3 players are.
  -Today's young people do not know a world without communication available round the clock (TV, mobile phones and the Internet)
  -- The "mother figure" of the future is a father…

Facts about TTeC 2006:
The Tromsø Telemedicine and eHealth Conference took place from 12-14 June 2006. This is the sixth time that the Norwegian Centre for Telemedicine in Tromsø has organized the conference, which this year gathered 350 participants from 29 countries for three days. The year's eHealth conference focuses on how modern technology can shape the future health service.

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