This past May 2013, the American Telemedicine Association (ATA) celebrated a milestone. It has been 20 years since the ATA was formed. Some of us were there. Most of us were not. Oh, what an amazing time it has been these past two decades! In 1993, there was some talk about cell phones and faster computers and even talk about tablet computing. Apple did have a Newton on the market. There were a number of Web sites up and running in 1993, but most people when they heard the term "Web" might have thought of Charlotte's or some other spider's web. By 1998 or so there was a market for personal digital assistants and cell phones. Somebody finally put those two together with computing power, and thus we now have smartphones. There were portable cassette players and portable CD players, and all new movies were released on VHS tape to watch on a large and heavy cathode ray tube-based television. Doctors still carried pagers, and video cameras were often carried on the shoulder. Telemedicine was just beginning to take root as a tool in medicine and in healthcare across multiple disciplines.
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