The use of Telehealth services has seen remarkable growth during the COVID-19 pandemic. Recent research found that 67% of Americans have used telehealth services during the COVID-19 pandemic, which is up from 46% prior to COVID-19. One might wonder if this growth is temporary or poised for more long-term growth post-pandemic.
To learn more about the growing trend of telehealth use, my agency worked with a data management firm to survey the American public about their experiences using telehealth during COVID-19 and whether or not they plan to continue to use these virtual medical services in the future.
Telehealth and Covid-19
One immediate observation that we learned as a result of this analysis is that 71% of Americans are currently fearful to visit their doctor’s office due to COVID-19. Because of these fears, many people have shifted towards using telehealth services during the pandemic. While 63% of respondents were originally apprehensive about their first telehealth visit, 72% reported enjoying their first telehealth experience.
What patients like most about telehealth
Why do patients prefer seeing a doctor virtually as opposed to in-person? Convivence safety and flexibility with appointments were the top responses. Many patients are shifting to telehealth as a means to avoid potential virus exposure.
Shorter wait-times are also driving people to telehealth appointments during the COVID-19 pandemic. Patients reported spending less time both between scheduling the appointment and the visit as well as time spent waiting in a virtual waiting room to be seen.
Access to care is another positive trend from increased telehealth use during COVID-19. Eighty percent (80%) of surveyed respondents believe telehealth has improved their ability to receive access to care during the pandemic. Seventy percent (70%) feel that telehealth provides adequate care and 65% believe telehealth provides accurate diagnosis to symptoms.
Telehealth visits also have the potential to replace some medical visits depending on the severity of the ailment. Sixty-six percent of our surveyed respondents feel telehealth will ultimately end up replacing in-person doctor visits that don’t require hands-on exams; 69% said they are less likely to use an ER or urgent care for non-life-threatening visits in the future if telehealth becomes more available.
As the nation slowly re-opens amid the COVID-19 pandemic and patients return to doctors’ offices in-person, demand still remains high for telehealth visits. According to a report earlier this year, virtual health care visits in the U.S. are on pace to top a record 1 billion by year’s end. What makes that statistic all the more remarkable is that just 24 percent of health care programs in the U.S. had an existing virtual health care program at the start of 2020.
This year’s rapid increase in demand for telehealth has been borne out of necessity, given that due to the pandemic, in-person patient visits were quickly deemed unsafe or infeasible nationwide. Many prior rules and regulations pertaining to telehealth usage, such as those around HIPAA regulations and payer coverage standards, were relaxed to encourage telehealth use.
Providers and patients alike quickly cast aside any prior concerns they may have had about telehealth quality, efficacy and ease of use, particularly for using telehealth to resolve pandemic-related health concerns. Of the more than 1 billion telehealth visits projected for 2020, noted above, 90 percent are related to COVID-19.
It remains to be seen if the relaxed regulatory and payer standards for telehealth will remain long-term. Many providers are naturally hesitant to invest further in telehealth right now, preferring to see what CMS and other payers decide long-term regarding telehealth visit rules and reimbursement standards.
By Jeff Fallon, chairman and CEO, eVideon Healthcare.
Jeff Fallon
Hospitals are changing their approach to patient care as a result of COVID-19. Though this may seem obvious, most healthcare technology conversations about COVID-19 revolve around the adoption of telehealth.
While hospitals are still in varying stages of adopting the technology, even conservative estimates show increases around 65% since before the pandemic. Surely that figure will grow to be much higher.
But healthcare’s technological revolution goes well beyond telehealth. Years ago, hospitals (sometimes unwittingly) entered the first major technology overhaul with the mandatory adoption of EHRs. While opinions differ on the ROI of that massive investment of time and money, there’s no denying EHRs completely transformed healthcare and established a new source of information for hospitals.
EHRs created more than just a new medical record; they threw open new potential to connect an ocean of wonderful but siloed technologies in a way that could transform the future of hospitals everywhere.
I don’t think it’s hyperbole to say now that telehealth and other digital health solutions will transform healthcare in a similarly large way. While patients can now speak to a doctor from their homes, the openness and willingness in the industry to change the way we look at how we connect patients to providers (not to mention families when in isolation, hospital services, and education) carries more potential than just visiting a doctor from home. Similar to how EHRs were considered just beginning years ago, telehealth is just beginning now.
Seeking professional help in the healthcare industry has become much easier than it was before. Thanks to technology that enabled us to lead a healthy life through healthcare mobile apps.
In recent times, there has been a great increase in these healthcare apps as they save doctor’s and patient’s time and also help healthcare workers to make some extra money in their leisure time.
A healthcare app should have the latest features based on the trend in the healthcare market. Before continuing reading we recommend viewing a post about how to create a health app on Riseapps blog. It will help you find out more about the medical app market, development process and costs.
In this article, we will talk about the five latest trends in the healthcare apps market that will make your app stand out among all the other healthcare apps.
It takes a pandemic to reveal how much digital technologies are ignored in the healthcare sector. The COVID-19 pandemic is dramatically transforming the healthcare sector and how professionals gather medical intelligence. Almost every physician worldwide has been part of a telemedicine movement to encourage patients to embrace safe and virtual appointments.
Consequently, preparing for a virtual appointment requires some getting used to. As a rule of thumb, patients can struggle to explain some of their symptoms, even in face-to-face interaction. That’s where real-time medical examination can help reduce misunderstandings.
In the virtual world, gathering evidence such as taking photos or filming a video that shows your symptoms and asking the right questions can guide the doctor to the appropriate diagnosis.
However, while we focus on making telehealth more accessible to patients, we also need to prepare doctors to make the most of it.
Find reliable HIPAA-compliant hosting
Gathering and storing digital data is not a novelty for healthcare centers. Nevertheless, keeping data storage HIPAA-compliant can become a challenge with the increased number of telehealth appointments. Protecting patients’ records in a fully digital world means relying on a highly secured data hosting strategy, as per Atlantic.net.
Contrary to common belief, there is no such thing as a HIPAA hosting body that can verify the compliance claims of each provider. For healthcare centers that need to adapt to the growing telemedicine demand, the quest for a robust, reliable, and HIPAA hosting provider becomes tricky and expensive.
Improvements in technology have greatly improved the accessibility to care when it comes to addiction treatment and recovery, and 5G is one of these changes that have been especially beneficial.
Improvements to telehealth, and the possibility of remote care has increased the quality of life for many recovering addicts.
In addition to this, 5G has made connecting to close friends and family, accessing online support groups and additional therapy, and the sending of essential medical information much easier and more reliable.
These improvements have only grown in relevancy as time goes on, and it will only continue to do so. For example, this relevancy is made very evident when considering the current COVID-19 pandemic. Here are 5 ways 5G will improve healthcare.
It improves telehealth
Telehealth is life changing for those living in rural and remote areas because traditional addiction treatment programs are often not available to people living in these parts of the world. 5G will make telehealth more reliable and productive.
Telehealth often involves video conferencing, and 5G will improve the video and audio quality of these online calls. This will make these remote appointments more effective. Other elements like the faster sending of emails, documents, and images will improve telehealth and make it more effective as well. Having mobile devices only enhances this accessibility of 5G, and these devices connected to 5G make attending appointments through telehealth even easier.
It allows for remote care
5G has made it possible to have reliable and safe real time care from the comfort of your own home. This is especially great for those who live in areas with traditional alcohol or drug rehabprograms that are at full capacity and areas where there are no traditional addiction treatment programs available at all. 5G allows for medical staff and therapists to check in with the recovering addict frequently.
“For example, if a person is detoxing from drugs or alcohol, frequent remote care is ideal and much safer than detoxing on one’s own. Online outpatient care is a type of treatment that has rapidly developed since the beginning of the pandemic,” said Mathew Gorman, CEO of Eudaimonia Recovery Homes. “It allows for proper treatment of withdrawal symptoms and early intervention if those symptoms become life-threatening.”
Among the many changes the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic has wrought, the new prominence of telehealth – healthcare delivered remotely, with provider and patient in different locations – has captured many imaginations. Has this changed the face of healthcare forever? Will visits to doctors’ offices become a thing of the past? Or will telehealth fade back into fringe use once the pandemic ends?
Telehealth before and during the COVID crisis
According to Kaiser Health News, 31% of Americans put off non-essential doctor visits during late March and early April 2020. Nearly a third of those surveyed said this was because they were concerned about contracting the virus. Meanwhile,FAIRHealth’s records show that telehealth claims increased by 5,679% from May 2019 to May 2020 – and urban telemedicine usage rose from .08% to 4.89%.
We can definitely say that COVID has influenced the adoption of telehealth over the last year. Interestingly, though, statistics indicate that telehealth was growing well before the pandemic existed. A study released in March 2019 predictedEurope’s telemedicine market would experience a compound annual growth rate of 16.72% between 2019 and 2024.
Clearly, there was existing interest around telehealth before COVID hit. After the crisis is over, what impact can we expect telehealth to have on medical care?
Telehealth and the future of medicine
SeveralMcKinsey surveys taken in April and May 2020 share interesting insights on the probable future of telehealth after COVID. Briefly, these studies found that:
76% of those surveyed were interested in using telehealth in the future.
74% of telehealth users were highly satisfied with the process.
57% of healthcare providers now view telehealth more favorably and 64% are more comfortable using it.
In addition to positive experiences and growing comfort with telehealth services, we also have to factor in the length of the current pandemic. In many areas, a second wave of infections is being reported; the longer people social distance and limit contact, the more using remote healthcare becomes a habit. And it looks like this habit will continue – not just because people are used to it, but because the same factors that propelled telemedicine forward pre-pandemic are still in force:
By Rakhee Langer, vice president, healow telehealth solutions, eClinicalWorks.
When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, it sparked revolutionary change across the health care industry, from a more focused need for ongoing communication with patients and telehealth solutions. Practices immediately had to shift their in-office visits to an online presence — changing with the times.
Initially, there was hesitation from both the patient and the provider whether conducting online visits would prove to be on par with in-person visits. However, the concerns surrounding technology adoption were quickly mitigated and both patients and providers found that telehealth was not just easy to adopt but also facilitated a productive medium for care.
During the peak of the pandemic, almost all visits were conducted via telehealth, helping to ensure the safety of both the patient and the provider. It was key to determine which types of visits could be done over telehealth.
We found that providers across all specialties—including neurology, behavioral health, pediatrics and dermatology—found ways to continue providing effective and comprehensive care. Of course, there are exceptions and certain types of visits that require an in-person physical examination.
However, physicians have found that telehealth is an avenue to conduct pre-surgery consults, post-surgery follow-ups and screenings in which it may not require the patient to come into the office. All specialties, including urgent care centers, have begun to use telehealth as well as solutions for check-in and bill payment that limit contact and thus reduce potential exposure to COVID-19.
The use of Telehealth services has seen remarkable growth during the COVID-19 pandemic. Recent research found that 67% of Americans have used telehealth services during the COVID-19 pandemic, which is up from 46% prior to COVID-19. One might wonder if this growth is temporary or poised for more long-term growth post-pandemic.
