CTN’s mission is to use broadband technology to improve access to the best quality health care in rural and medically underserved communities statewide.

The CTN is the product of an unprecedented statewide coalition of healthcare, technology, government, and other stakeholders, that drafted a proposal in spring 2007 to the Federal Communications Commission. Under the FCC’s Rural Health Care Pilot Program – with the goal of significantly increasing access to acute, primary and preventive health care in rural America – the FCC will provide California with up to $22.1 million over three years. Additional funds for the CTN have been provided by the California Emerging Technology Fund, and UnitedHealth/PacifiCare.

The CTN project intends to leverage and build upon California’s historic and recent investments in telehealth. In recent years, a number of exciting initiatives have been launched in California to advance the use of telecommunications and health care technology.

CTN will connect over 800 California healthcare providers in underserved areas to a state- and nation-wide broadband network dedicated to healthcare.