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In 2001, a team of French and American physicians in New York made history by remotely conducting surgery on a patient in Strasbourg, France, relying on broadband transmission and a surgical robot named Zeus.

This landmark trans-oceanic operation, referred to as the Lindbergh operation, catapulted telemedicine from the realm of science-fiction into reality.

According to the American Telemedicine Association, telemedicine constitutes the use of medical information exchanged from one site to another via electronic communications to improve a patient’s clinical health status.

Often interchangeably referred to as telehealth, the practice includes a growing variety of applications and services using two-way video, email, smart phones, wearable devices, wireless tools and other forms of telecommunications technology.

“Telemedicine is nothing new,” suggests John Nosta (right), a global digital health evangelist and Google Health advisory board member.

He continues: “When the telephone became a common household device, patients started using the phone to speak to their doctors instead of going to a clinic or getting him/her to make a house call. The telephone is technology, that conversation is care. Together, that’s telemedicine.”