Telehealth News and Market Developments
The Verge: Opioid addiction treatment is collateral damage in online prescription backlash (8/11) – Pandemic-era rules around telemedicine have been a huge boost to efforts to prevent opioid overdoses in the US. Telehealth led to clear improvements in treatment access for people with opioid addiction or dependence, also known as opioid-use disorder. During COVID, the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) allowed providers to prescribe controlled substances via telehealth without an in-person visit, bridging access gaps for patients during the pandemic. But the policies that led to those improvements in access aren’t guaranteed to stay in place, and many pharmacies have been reluctant to refill prescriptions for controlled substances via telehealth in recent months.
Forbes: Why Telehealth And Nurses Should Go Hand-In-Hand (8/10) – Virtual nurses can increase flexibility, reduce some of the friction points that delay treatment and incorporate better administrative support for frontline registered nurses (RNs). “Roadmapping” adds predictability to the implementation of telehealth-enabled care models that build on the foundational platform. This includes audio and video technology, engagement and clinical decision software and interoperability of electronic medical records (EMR) for ordering medication and documentation. Similarly, the Alliance for Connected Care’s
recent survey
of patients and providers found 91 percent of practitioners surveyed believe telehealth has allowed for greater flexibility to meet the needs of both patients and health care practitioners.
Health Leaders Media: New Partnership Combines Virtual Mental Health Care with Mobile Integrated Health (8/10) – Brave Health, whose telehealth platform delivers mental health services to patients in 18 states, is joining forces with MedArrive to collaborate on home-based services. The collaboration enables MedArrive's mobile care teams to connect with Brave Health's virtual care platform when a patient at home is in need of and requests mental health care services. Conversely, Brave Health can organize a home visit by a MedArrive team if it sees a need.
Healthcare IT News: How Intermountain Healthcare gets top marks for virtual care (8/9) – Alliance board member Intermountain Healthcare has earned a Press Ganey Top Box Score of more than 80 percent for its scheduled video visit service, with patients requesting more digital engagement as they learn about the option. The platform gives the caregiver full control over a powerful high-definition PTZ (pan-tilt-zoom) camera, audio controls and night vision capabilities to facilitate direct patient engagement. Additionally, cultural and language services are easily added to any visit to ensure patients receive care in any of 200 languages.
Boston Children’s Hospital: Bringing mental health services to gender-diverse patients: The benefits of telehealth (8/9) – The COVID-19 pandemic has had an outsized impact on the pediatric mental and behavioral health crisis, which is especially true for transgender youth who were already at increased risk for mental health concerns before the pandemic. This article by members of Gender Multispecialty Service (GeMS) shares the organization’s best practices learned from adopting virtual mental health services during the pandemic. Best practices included the creation of virtual therapy groups, increased access due to less transportation time, and increased rapport between providers and patients. Telehealth services have been a big step for greater access to care for transgender and gender diverse youth.
Hospice News: How AccentCare Used Telehealth to Reduce Hospitalization (8/8) – AccentCare has leveraged telehealth services as a means of reducing the length of hospital stays for patients who are receiving fragmented care. As they deployed their telehealth programs, AccentCare began using those services as an additional layer of support for patients who did not have a primary care physician to follow up after a hospital discharge. The organization believes it would be a missed opportunity not to enhance and expand its provider services via telehealth, particularly in palliative care.
Healthcare IT News: Geisinger's telemedicine program shoots from 20 specialties to more than 70 (8/8) – Geisinger Health System serves predominately rural communities with patients facing barriers to getting the care they need. Telehealth alleviates the challenges these patients face in managing their health by creating access to routine and specialty appointments from wherever is most convenient for them. After implementing telehealth, Geisinger Health System has achieved satisfaction rates well above 80 percent across many demographic groups, including patients over 65 years of age.
Politico: Fraud is the killjoy at the telehealth party (8/7) – When the House recently passed legislation in a landslide vote extending Medicare reimbursements for medical visits that occur by video or phone call through 2024, it had vast bipartisan support. However, concerns that telehealth could become an enabler of fraud were raised by various House members. But telehealth advocates and experts argue that much of what recent reports by the Department of Justice has found isn’t specific to telemedicine and that fraud is not unique solely to telehealth, and therefore shouldn’t be cited as reason to restrict telehealth access.
mHealth Intelligence: How Best Buy Plans to Facilitate Provider-Patient Connections to Further RPM (8/5) – At a keynote session at the 2nd Annual Remote Patient Monitoring Virtual Summit in July, Diana Gelston, vice president of virtual care sales, marketing, and client success at Best Buy Health, discussed a wide array of topics, including the evolution of health care consumerism, Best Buy's health care-focused plans, and how the company is differentiating itself from other new entrants into health care. With its recent acquisitions of GreatCall, Inc and Current Health, Best Buy can enable providers to remotely monitor and adjust treatments for patients with chronic and acute conditions.
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