Empowering patients with telehealth

Perspectives

Empowering patients with telehealth

A call to action

Challenges facing care delivery in today’s health care environment are considerable and will require strategies and solutions to address extending care access, improving care quality, and lowering the cost of care. Telehealth is an essential component of achieving this “triple aim” and paving the way for system-wide improvement and goal attainment.

Telehealth: A component of health care transformation

As the health care industry continues to evolve to meet patients’ health care needs, providers should consider the implementation of a telehealth solution that enhances current capabilities and extends timely, convenient, affordable, and high quality care that patients and their beneficiaries deserve.

​Patient stories: A wide variety of telehealth use cases

Today, Americans face a number of daunting obstacles to receiving the care they need. Not all health care systems have the capability of prioritizing the need, urgency, and modality of care for incoming appointments, leaving patients with serious medical issues in potentially life-threatening situations. Conversely, many simple ailments could be addressed with minimal time and health care resources.

Telehealth can enable immediate assessment and triage, extend and improve primary care, increase access to high-demand specialty care, facilitate behavioral health support, and advance chronic disease management and home care.

Successful implementation of a telehealth platform

The successful deployment of a telehealth solution, like any large-scale implementation, requires a well-coordinated design and execution effort. Such an implementation comprises several components: governance development, a broad needs assessment, technology assessment, information exchange, training strategy, workflow redesign, and user outreach strategy. These factors are critical to realizing the full benefits of telehealth.

Telehealth powers of tomorrow

​Telehealth can enable health care systems to extend high quality care to patients throughout their journey across the care spectrum, from initial triage and primary care, through to specialty medicine and home care. Telehealth is also a powerful tool to help health care systems optimize the use of their clinician talent and resources, regardless of where they physically reside—providers can perform telehealth visits with patients across state boundaries, bringing expert care to a patient bedside or into a patient home when needed. Lastly, telehealth offers a means for patients and providers to connect more frequently without the geographic and mobility barriers presented by in-person visits.

Momentum for modern telehealth adoption is accelerating. Health care systems now have the opportunity to implement the next phase of powerful health technology—flexible, real-time telehealth that brings care to patients anytime, anywhere.

Meet the authors

RJ Krawiec, leader, Deloitte Consulting LLP

Jessica Nadler, PhD, senior manager, Deloitte Consulting LLP

Corinne Hausmann, PhD, specialist master, Deloitte Consulting LLP

Ryan DeWerd, senior consultant, Deloitte Consulting LLP

Peter Kinchley, senior consultant, Deloitte Consulting LLP

Cristina Bricoli, analyst, Deloitte Consulting LLP

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