Over the last decade, technology has revolutionized every facet of human life. It has transformed the way we look at the world. Though any one can list down the several changes that have occurred that can be attributed to modern tech, the most impactful change yet has been in the health sector. Every quest of mankind has been undertaken to make life better and longer. Telemedicine is one such pioneering development in the health sector.
50 years ago, a few doctors had experimented with a basic form of telemedicine, in an effort to reach patients in remote locations. Today, it has taken the shape of a virtual clinic that offers video consultation, 24/7 service and online diagnosis.
How telemedicine impacts global healthcare?
Telemedicine helps connect patients to the expertise of a doctor in a remote manner. Both the stakeholders can reap the rich benefits of this tech. The patient can gather necessary medical data using gadgets and transmit them to his doctor. The doctor can simply diagnose the issue and prescribe medicines online. This is a boon for patients who cannot travel. Immobile, paralyzed men, men who live in poorly connected areas, and men who suffer from mental diseases such as anxiety can make use of this technology. Moreover, patients don’t need to go through the trouble of taking appointments and standing in queues for routine checkups. They can simply video chat with their doctor across any platform such as Skype or Facetime to receive timely advice.
Banner health, a Phoenix based frontrunner in telemedicine, has decided to swap the term telemedicine with virtual health.
According to Deborah Dahl, vice president of patient care innovation at Banner Health, telemedicine has a video component while virtual health encapsulates video, artificial intelligence, apps and other technology.
What was a figment of science fiction novels has now become a stark reality. Read below to understand how telemedicine is poised to transform the global healthcare scenario.
Rising volume of online patients
Gone are the days of visiting a doctor for minor illnesses. An independent study found that a majority of the people prefer to consult a doctor online for issues such as sinus, rashes etc. This is a result of the direct — to — consumer feature of this tech where most of the innovation and investment has been concentrated. This has also been the most commercially successful feature. Owing to the ability of telemedicine to engage even the most remote people, it has opened up the gates to a new market.
According to a Rand study, published in 2017, telemedicine seems to attract a whole new crop of patients who otherwise might not seek medical care.
This has, especially, been the case in India and China. Both these nations have a vast untapped market in their rural areas. Most of the doctors are condensed in the metropolitan cities. This creates a barrier for sufferers in far off regions, hundreds if not thousands of kilometers away. With the advent of telemedicine, one can simply use a laptop and internet to meet the doctor, face to face.
People with busy professional lives have jam packed schedules. They often resort to over the counter medication without consulting a doctor beforehand due to lack of time. They can now talk to a doctor at their own convenience without worry. There are other disabilities too, that discourage consumers from visiting a clinic. Stigma around sexual diseases and mental health can now be effectively tackled using telemedicine. Such consultations can now be conducted in the privacy of their homes.
Better and easier patient monitoring
By employing the use of telemedicine, the doctor can enable a more relaxed environment for his patient, since every person is most comfortable in his own home. It also allows the doctor to inspect the living environment for hazards such as falling. Often, doctors using this tech, end up interviewing the primary caregiver too in an effort to gain more information about the patient and his routine. They can also monitor the medicines that the patient consumes on a daily basis. It is quite common for patients with chronic illnesses to ingest unnecessary medication. This can now be avoided. Serious patients can be kept under 24 hour supervision in homes as well as hospitals. The vital readings can constantly be monitored without being physically present. This allows the doctor to not only cover more patients but also allows the patient to be at ease.
OSF Healthcare in Peoria, IL, uses a telemonitoring application that gathers data from EMRs and other monitoring systems. Subtle changes can now be tracked that otherwise might go unnoticed. OSF has recorded a 26% decrease in mortality rate and 20% decrease in length of stay since the inception of their application.
Self-service
Anyone who visits a doctor expects to be greeted by a live person at the clinic. Not a robot or a computer. But this dynamic is set to change according to Dr. Pitt, neuroradiologist at Barrow Neurological Institute. He believes that quite a few market players are gaining headway in self service solutions. But he also cautions that telemedicine will always remain a hybrid model, requiring some form of human contact to create trust between the stakeholders.
Over to you!
These apps use artificial intelligence to collect necessary data and streamline the whole process. This reduces a lot of the load of the physicians. The bots take the user through a series of questions and responses to gather data. Some bots are also advance enough to study those responses and deduce a preliminary diagnosis. This interaction makes the clinical process more efficient and easy. This is still an emerging area of telemedicine but has a lot of promise.
