Telehealth and Its Impact on Healthcare Delivery

Technology has influenced many facets of life, and healthcare is not an exemption. Over the last few years, several digital healthcare startups have sprung up, and this has simplified the process of healthcare delivery to remote places and people who find it difficult to commute.

Modern life has undergone tremendous transformation because of the internet and progressive software. This useful tool has changed the way we communicate and keep in touch with family and friends, how we consummate financial transactions, and how goods and services are negotiated and purchased.

There are so many telehealth tools that you can choose from if you are keen on receiving quality healthcare services and managing your health and wellbeing. For instance, a diabetic person can tap into the power of telehealth by uploading food logs, blood sugar level, and medications through a mobile device.

Telehealth is a broad concept that covers critical areas such as health education services, telemedicine (which implies consulting a doctor or medical expert from home or any other comfortable location via remote means), remote monitoring of symptoms and important signs such as blood pressure, etc.

Popular telehealth services that may be beneficial to your well-being include patient portal, virtual appointments (this means you can see your doctor via remote means such as videoconferencing), doctors communicating with doctors, personal health records (which is an electronic store of a person’s health information, it is called PHR for short), and personal health apps (there are so many mobile and web-based applications that make it easier to organize medical information in a secure manner).

Telehealth is also called e-health or m-health (mobile health). Primarily, it is aimed at achieving the following:

1. Ensuring people living in rural areas and isolated locations are not deprived of basic healthcare.
2. Enhance accessibility and availability of healthcare services for people that are partially or completely immobile or folks that do not have a lot of transportation options.
3. Make information transfer easier and simpler for members of a health care team.

What are the limitations of telehealth?

Although telehealth can take health care and how it is delivered to greater heights, there are a few limitations. Perhaps, the most obvious limitation of telehealth is health care fragmentation. When the process of health care is fragmented, it can create gaps in care, incorrect use of medications, and over-reliance on medical care.

Other factors that may limit the benefits of telehealth include affordability, availability of internet facilities, cost of mobile devices and gadgets, and insurance reimbursement.

All in all, it is expected that telehealth will continue to expand and increase in popularity. Obviously, since the coronavirus broke out in 2019, it has changed a lot of things and one of such is the approach to work. Digitization of office procedures have become the norm. A lot of medical procedures can be conducted remotely, and this improves process efficiency. This will not only save the time of the patient and doctor; it will also eliminate the stress and effort required to commute. With telehealth, there is also the self-service option which involves patients carrying out medical processes with virtual support and using useful apps and tools.

View all Articles by: Melissa Clark, CCS-P