Spacebridge to Armenia: A Look Back at Its Impact on Telemedicine in Disaster Response

On December 7, 1988, an earthquake destroyed a significant portion of the Spitak Region of Soviet Armenia. The destruction resulted in significant death toll, building and infrastructure destroyed, and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of people. The entire local medical infrastructure was significantly damaged. Before the disaster, the space medical leadership of the United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics were collaborating on joint activities in medicine and biology. The leaders of this collaborative effort devised an approach to support a disaster recovery utilizing telecommunications assets. This effort was focused on healthcare in a postdisaster event and became known as the Spacebridge to Armenia. This spacebridge was put in place 5 months after the calamity and operated for several months in the spring-summer of 1989. The spacebridge was extended to Ufa, Russia, in response to a second disaster. The influence of the Spacebridge to Armenia in the 20 years since has been significant. This article summarizes how telemedicine has evolved from the response to the earthquake in 1988. It presents lessons learned and illustrates the many influences that have been made.