E-health and e-medicine.

The world of e-health and e-medicine offer hematologists and oncologists wonderful opportunities to enhance and expand their practices and to offer patients the opportunity to gain access to information and specialty care never before available. Legal and political challenges abound, however, concerning the practice and financing of e-health and e-medicine. Financing and reimbursement for e-medicine are limited, licensure laws are structured in a way that inhibits telemedicine's widespread growth, public protection efforts are sluggish and spotty at best, and there are tremendous areas of uncertainty about such issues as malpractice exposure, patients' rights, and proper practices concerning physician-patient e-mail. It is impossible to predict what health care delivery will look like even a decade from now (and some would argue it would be a fool's errand to attempt to do so) [56]; however, despite all of these obstacles, physicians should continue to explore innovative ways to integrate computer technology and the Internet into medical practice.