Tag Archives: TELEMEDICINE
DOCTORS PODCAST: MEDICAL & TELEHEALTH NEWS (JAN 23)
A weekly podcast on the latest medical, science and telehealth news.
Telemedicine: Its Benefits In Rural Montana (CDC)
Telemedicine: Study Finds 87% Diagnosis Accuracy
In one study published in JAMA Open Network, researchers found that 87% of the preliminary diagnoses made during telemedicine appointments were later confirmed during in-person appointments.
To put it simply: diagnoses over video are usually spot on.
December 2, 2022 – Researchers evaluated more than 97,000 video visits across Mayo Clinic between March and June 2020. Of those visits, 2,400 patients had a visit for a new health concern and followed up with an in-person appointment within 90 days.
The highest rate of matching telemedicine and in-person diagnoses was found in specialties that included psychiatry and psychology, allergy and immunology, orthopedics, and urology. While diagnostic concordance was slightly lower in specialties such as dermatology and ear, nose and throat (ENT), still, close to 80% of those diagnoses were confirmed in person.
Survey: 85% Of Physicians Favor Telehealth To Treat Opioid Use Disorder (Yale)
Asurvey of more than 1,000 registered physicians who used telehealth services to treat patients with opioid-use disorder during COVID-19 found that an overwhelming majority favor making telehealth a permanent part of their practice.
“Recent exposure to telehealth due to the COVID-19 pandemic has promoted the perspective among the physicians surveyed that it is a viable and effective treatment option for patients,” said the study’s lead author Tamara Beetham, MPH, a PhD student in health policy and management at YSPH. “Findings like these could have major implications for the future of telehealth regulation. Continued flexibility would allow more individuals to access life-saving treatment.”
A staggering 107,622 people in the U.S. died of drug overdose in 2021, a 15% increase from 2020, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Physicians frequently prescribe buprenorphine to treat opioid-use disorder and reduce the risk of overdose. Patients must regularly follow up with their provider as part of their treatment.
Telemedicine: Elderly Are Most Satisfied Study Finds
“Our study showed that the highest level of patient satisfaction within telemedicine visits was actually among patients within the 65 to 79-year-old age range—which has been an age group often seen as resistant to this mode of care,” says Bart Demaerschalk, M.D., a Mayo Clinic neurologist and senior author. “These findings show how important it is that health care organizations don’t exclusively target telemedicine to their younger, more tech-savvy patients.”
The study, published in the Patient Experience Journal, evaluated patient satisfaction scores from over 300,000 patients treated either in-person or via video telemedicine during the COVID-19 pandemic.
While researchers found that patient satisfaction ratings were overall equivalent across the two modes of care, they did observe several interesting trends within certain age groups, genders, and races, which countered historical perceptions of telemedicine and represent opportunities for future study.
Telemedicine: UCM Digital Health Aids NY Hospitals
Telemedicine could soon offer relief local emergency rooms desperately need.
UCM Digital Health offers a digitally integrated, whole person health solution that provides patients with immediate access to care on their terms.
UCM combines a digital front door platform, multi-disciplinary team of providers, and a 24/7 telehealth triage, treatment, and navigation service to provide a range of patient services, including emergent and urgent care, primary and specialty care, behavioral health, and more. Care begins digitally and can seamlessly integrate across other points of care for a simple patient experience.
UCM brings together clinical expertise, advanced technology and compassionate care to offer powerful advantages for insurers, employers, patients and providers.
Telemedicine: New Survey Finds Virtual Care Is Now Mainstream Care Delivery
“Telemedicine is here to stay,” said Dr. Rahul Sharma, professor and chair of emergency medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine and co-author of a commentary on the results. “Health care organizations really need to think about the next steps regarding the future of virtual care, such as how we integrate it into our systems, and how to make sure we are meeting the needs of both our clinicians and our patients.”
The survey, conducted in March, polled members of NEJM’s Catalyst Insight Council who are clinicians, clinical leaders and executives in organizations that deliver care. The survey received 984 responses from around the world, 609 from the United States. Dr. Sharma, who is also emergency physician-in-chief at New York-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center and executive director of the Center for Virtual Care at Weill Cornell Medicine, helped formulate the questions with his co-author Dr. Judd E. Hollander, senior vice president of health care delivery innovation at Sidney Kimmel Medical College at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia.
Of U.S. respondents, 71 percent reported that telemedicine has improved patient health, while a similar proportion said it provides at least moderate quality specialty or mental health care. For primary care, that share was 81 percent. When responses across all countries are included, the results differ only slightly from those of U.S. respondents.
Technology: Smart, Voice-Assisted Operating Rooms
Are Amazon Alexa and Google Home limited to our bedrooms, or can they be used in hospitals? Do you envision a future where physicians work hand-in-hand with voice AI to revolutionize healthcare delivery? In the near future, clinical smart assistants will be able to automate many manual hospital tasks—and this will be only the beginning of the changes to come.
Voice AI is the future of physician-machine interaction and this Focus book provides invaluable insight on its next frontier. It begins with a brief history and current implementations of voice-activated assistants and illustrates why clinical voice AI is at its inflection point. Next, it describes how the authors built the world’s first smart surgical assistant using an off-the-shelf smart home device, outlining the implementation process in the operating room. From quantitative metrics to surgeons’ feedback, the authors discuss the feasibility of this technology in the surgical setting. The book then provides an in-depth development guideline for engineers and clinicians desiring to develop their own smart surgical assistants. Lastly, the authors delve into their experiences in translating voice AI into the clinical setting and reflect on the challenges and merits of this pursuit.
The world’s first smart surgical assistant has not only reduced surgical time but eliminated major touch points in the operating room, resulting in positive, significant implications for patient outcomes and surgery costs. From clinicians eager for insight on the next digital health revolution to developers interested in building the next clinical voice AI, this book offers a guide for both audiences.
Journals: Telemedicine And e-Health – June 2022
What Works Best to Engage Participants in Mobile App Interventions and e-Health: A Scoping Review
Enhancing participant engagement is considered a key priority for wellness and health care, especially as health care undergoes a shift toward the integration of digital technologies (e.g., mobile apps, health care monitors, and online portals with their consumer interfaces).1,2 Technological systems play a critical role in enhancing participant engagement.1,2 Among urban and low-income mothers, the use of smart-device technology for communication was a particularly important contributor to higher retention in longitudinal studies.3 Providing digital health tools has not only led to an increase in study participation adherence rates,4 but it has also contributed to measurable improvements in health care outcomes across several conditions. For instance, greater patient activation in their health care improved patient adherence to treatment prescriptions.5 Participants’ use of web portals to augment treatment of diabetes demonstrated improved glycemic control across multiple studies.6–8 Other studies have seen improvements in participants with HIV,9 with coronary artery disease,10 and with depression,11–13 highlighting how impactful the implementation of these tools can be across different clinical populations.
Schoeppe et al.14 emphasized common strategies that successful mobile interventions often use, such as goal setting, self-monitoring, and performance feedback in their app design. To our knowledge, however, there has not been a scoping review of the specific components of mobile intervention apps that increase engagement. Common across all digital health tools are the focus on increased patient engagement and “empowerment,” which is a result of several qualities inherent in these tools. Most of these technological systems improve patients’ communication with and access to health care providers,1,2,15 and provide patients with more comprehensive information about their health on demand.2,15 While these qualities are common across successful tools and play a large part in improving patient self-management and decreasing stress,2 improved engagement is no guarantee.
Furthermore, measuring engagement is a challenge that has likely contributed to our lack of knowledge on app components that effectively increase this important metric. There are now several measures that quantify the amount of engagement that patients feel toward the digital tools and apps that are being developed,2,15 but these are not widely used and engagement measurements are not standardized across studies. Some examples of such measures are the Patient Activation Measure (PAM16), Mobile App Rating Scale (MARS17), and the Patient Health Engagement scale (PHE-s18). These measures create a quantifiable standardized method by which researchers can measure the phenomenon of user engagement during program development, and are important considerations when creating new digital tools for patients and clinical research participants.
Doctors Without Waiting Rooms 