Benefits of Telehealth

Today, the need for instant access to healthcare services is in high demand. With telehealth, it’s possible to reimagine the physician visit and transform it into a house call without having to travel to an office. The concept of the virtual visit is something that’s been around for several decades, and the use of telemedicine has been deployed across an array of service lines and specialties from radiology to primary care, orthopedics, cardiology, and more.

Telehealth is a technology that’s beneficial for both specialized and primary care doctors, which allows them to increase their reach, treat patients where there is a connection to the internet, and more. In the past, these virtual healthcare platforms were launched from health care systems because they have the funds to purchase the needed technology to support the service.

While this is true, today, telehealth applications are offered as SaaS (software-as-a-service) and are as easy to access as picking up a smartphone. The modern telehealth platforms no longer require huge upfront costs to get started but, instead, are available at no cost to the patient.

For those who aren’t sure that telemedicine and home health care has to offer them, keep reading. Here they can learn about the biggest benefits of this technology.

Advances in New Business Models

Telemedicine as a business model is helping to shift the paradigm by propelling the consumer-based care industry. Today, with this technology in place, specialists can launch their platform providing telehealth services to consumers. Now, they can offer their services online, like real estate agents, bankers, and an array of other people who are in business. With this technology in place, clinicians can extend their patient base significantly beyond the office environment, extend their hours, and create more convenient and new models for their patients to use.

Remote Monitoring Helps to Improve Patient Engagement

With the growing healthcare needs and the value-based reimbursement model in the healthcare industry, many health systems and hospitals are finding new methods to interact with patients to ensure they are engaging in various self-care activities and have access to heathcare treatments. Today, treating patients proactively will require a clinician to teach their patients the best way to care for themselves between visits to the office.

With a growing concern for chronic health conditions, the use of telemedicine for remote monitoring services is one of the best ways that medical providers can work to improve the outcome of care while still reducing costs. Now, telehealth has been used for physical therapy, reporting metrics from patients, and medication management, all from the comfort of a person’s home while remote teams help engage patients in their healthcare journey.

Reach More Patients and Expand Access to Care

With growing shortages of physicians, it is possible to expand provider networks in new and innovative ways, which also expands a person’s access to care. Telemedicine can be used to reach patients who live in rural areas and are outside of the typical care delivery systems. It’s also possible to use the tool for midlevel patient education, along with physician diagnosis, to reach people in many new ways.

Increase Practice Efficiency and Clinical Workflows

Put simply, telemedicine can effectively increase workflow efficiency in a clinical setting. It can essentially serve as the conduit needed for the faster prioritization of the delivery of care, allowing each case and individual to be triaged quickly, all while improving communication between departments by capturing, storing, and using the patient data available to make more informed decisions. Telehealth is said to feature an array of best-performing practices. The available tools can help to facilitate performance improvements, which includes growing patient satisfaction scores.

Reduces Patient Costs

Patients typically spend quite a bit of money seeking healthcare services. With a telehealth visit, doctors are coming to the patients via the phone, computer, or another type of connected, digital device. Just think about the costs related to parking, travel, taking time off work, and childcare for a single office visit. The extra effort it takes to travel to a doctor’s office is stressful, but the costs will add up. In rural areas, patients may have to travel for a day or more to reach a specialist located in an urban area. With telemedicine, these costs are reduced significantly. On average, the cost to go to the emergency room is around $7,734 and the average cost of going to a doctor’s office is around $146. On average, a telemedicine visit only costs about $79. And telemedicine is typically covered by most insurance carriers. 

There is no question that telemedicine offers a viable option for individuals who need medical care but can’t or don’t want to go into a doctor’s office. Today, telemedicine is growing and will soon become mainstream. Telemedicine services can now be accessed around the world, which also provides healthcare services to those who may not have had access to this type of care in the past. Being informed and knowing what this technology offers is the best way to see all the potential it has and offers for people today and in the future.