A recent survey found that three-quarters of patients said they were very or completely satisfied with the virtual care they’d received, but many left the visit without understanding the next steps. By Kat Jercich July 13, 2020 Three-quarters of patients who obtained healthcare virtually during the pandemic said they want it to be a standard part […]
AS COVID-19 SPREAD across the nation from March to April 2020, use of telehealth services continued to grow. That surge is shown by FAIR Health’s Monthly Telehealth Regional Tracker, which uses our database of over 31 billion private health care claim records – the largest such repository in the nation – to track the month-by-month evolution of […]
Digital health data is growing at such an astronomical rate that its volume is measured in exabytes – 2,314 exabytes, by one projection. (For the record, one exabyte = one billion gigabytes; and “all words ever spoken by human beings” would need 5 exabytes of storage if saved as text.) The value of this digital health […]
Using technology remotely to care for patients can go way beyond Zoom calls or basic telehealth measures. Professor Simon Malpas explains how tech can start to even out inequity in healthcare. Imagine you live in Ahipara, Northland. You also have early stage heart failure. It’s a 90-minute drive to your nearest hospital in Kerikeri. Your […]
The COVID-19 pandemic is increasing the use of telehealth in the United States, with 46 percent of consumers now preferring a telehealth visit over a traditional trip to a doctor’s office, according to a recent McKinsey & Company survey. In contrast, only 11 percent of patients preferred telehealth over office visits prior to the pandemic. […]
On June 25, 2020, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (“CMS”) announced its proposed Home Health Prospective Payment System Rule, for calendar year 2021 (the “Rule”), which aims to increase home health agency Medicare payment rates. This Rule also includes a provision to make permanent the regulatory changes related to telecommunication technologies in providing […]
With the last of the COVID-19 Telehealth Program awards handed out, the Federal Communications Commission is ready to review the $200 million program’s effectiveness and move on to the Connected Care Pilot. By Eric Wicklund July 10, 2020 – The Federal Communications Commission has drained its $200 million COVID-19 Telehealth Program. Wednesday’s announcement of the final 25 funding […]
Despite reimbursement barriers, home health care providers have long used telehealth and mHealth tools to improve care. Could COVID-19 expand those opportunities? July 10, 2020 – With the world stuck in the midst of a pandemic, health systems are looking to telehealth to shift the balance of care out of the hospital or clinic and into the […]
HHS Secretary Alex Azar said during a July 9 virtual The Hill event that he supports expanding telehealth provisions that were lifted during the coronavirus pandemic and the agency plans to work with Congress for greater coverage. “I think we’d have a revolution if anyone tried to go backwards on this,” Mr. Azar said, according to Politico. “This is […]
Since mid-March, the AARC has pushed the Administration to include respiratory therapists as telehealth practitioners during the COVID-19 pandemic. Under their wavier authority, CMS announced that it would extend the types of practitioners who could furnish telehealth to those who could bill Medicare directly for their services. That, of course, left RTs out of the […]
(Boston)–The COVID-19 pandemic has prompted a rapid expansion of telehealth use in the U.S. While articles have been published on telehealth and best practices for patient-centered communication during the crisis, none have focused on applying principles of trauma-informed care until now. COVID-19 is traumatizing for many and has a disproportionate impact on those who have […]
Using trauma-informed principles in telehealth visits may mitigate health impacts of COVID-19 while increasing engagement in care and opportunities for protective, healing connections BOSTON UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE (Boston)–The COVID-19 pandemic has prompted a rapid expansion of telehealth use in the U.S. While articles have been published on telehealth and best practices for patient-centered communication […]
WASHINGTON (ABC7) — Telehealth has gone from a novelty to necessity during the pandemic as patients’ fears grow over contracting COVID-19 at hospitals and primary care offices. “Heart attack, strokes, cardiac arrests. They don’t stop because of COVID,” said Dr. Reginald Robinson of the American Heart Association during a District of Columbia news conference Wednesday. The District, along […]
The new telehealth-specific electronic clinical quality measures are to be used by eligible professionals and clinicians participating in CMS quality reporting programs such as MIPS and APMs. By Mike Miliard July 09, 2020 The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services has put together further detailed guidance for how healthcare providers should be documenting and reporting electronic […]
During the COVID-19 public health emergency (PHE), the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) has authorized new flexibility for medical residents and teaching physicians to rely on telehealth when caring for Medicare beneficiaries. For many types of services, it is no longer necessary for the patient, resident and supervising physician to all be in […]