High-resolution cameras and speedy internet connections to a doctor's clinic in Norfolk, Neb., are helping some cash-strapped schools provide nursing services they might not otherwise be able to afford.

"It is a good way to level the playing field for rural areas in getting good health care," Dr. Keith Vrbicky said of his American Educational Telecommunications LLC.

Through internet broadcasts to schools, Vrbicky's company provides advice from nurses—and doctors, if necessary—on hard-to-diagnose cases. It also offers information on asthma, diabetes, adolescent development, and other topics.

Vrbicky, an obstetrician-gynecologist, started the company in 1997 to focus on international telemedicine and distance education. He opened an office in Egypt, but business slowed after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

So, he turned to helping schools in his own state, providing internet nursing services for free last year to schools in Leigh, West Point, and Pleasanton, Neb. He now charges for the service and is starting a pilot program for businesses.

"It's very beneficial to schools that don't have a nurse, and our experiences with them were very good," said Larry Ferguson, superintendent of Leigh Community Schools.

Vrbicky hopes to help alleviate problems caused by a nationwide nursing shortage and school budget cuts.

His company may be the only one providing this kind of service to schools, although some universities and medical colleges have undertaken similar projects, said Jonathan Linkous, executive director of the American Telemedicine Association.

Vrbicky declined to release his company's financial details, but said he hoped to turn a profit this year.

Westside Community Schools in Omaha signed up its 10 elementary schools this school year after Douglas County cut funding for a visiting nurses program that the district had relied on.

At Westside's Swanson Elementary School, health assistant Nancy Yount can activate a videoconference in less than a minute when she links with Vrbicky's clinic 90 miles away.

Yount's computer screen fills with a hallway and doors in Vrbicky's office, and shortly afterward a nurse enters the picture.

In the right hand corner is a smaller square, showing Yount in her own office, together with a student at her side cooperating with a demonstration.

Yount picks up a high-resolution video camera connected to the computer and trains it on the student's injury. A nurse on the other end gets a close look while talking through the computer to Yount and the student.

"It's a nice tool to have," said Yount, who has used it several times this school year, including to help verify that a student had shingles and the best course of action for dealing with it.

Outside Nebraska, 21 schools in southeast Kansas are getting the service, and Vrbicky's company recently signed a contract with the Universidad Autonoma de Guardalajara's School of Medicine in Guadalajara, Mexico. The university will use the network to help provide clinical care in Mexico and elsewhere.