Telehealth Tuesday Articles, May 2024
This month, three of my four articles were much more a commentary on current affairs, than the usual telehealth guidance.
I started the month with my analysis of the two big announcements by Optum and Walmart to shut down their telehealth service lines, followed by my observation on the current status of telehealth across the various healthcare delivery organizations.
The third commentary was my favorite outlook to the future of healthcare: increasing its ability to leverage the power of digital health innovation way more rapidly than healthcare has in the past two decades.
Wrapping up the month I reiterated the promising use case for telehealth expansion into libraries, inspired by having seen a handful of presentations on library-based telehealth access points in at least 5 states.
Enjoy your readings!
Big Business’ Telehealth Experiment On the American Patient
The recent shutdown of telehealth-enabled healthcare by Walgreens, Walmart, and Optum sure took many in the industry by surprise and started to raise some eyebrows about the long-term sustainability of telehealth. But fear not (and read on).
Fueled by a dozen of fascinating presentations and over 100 engaging conversations at MATRC, NRTRC, ATA, and NACHC’s CHCO I am reflecting on Telehealth’s history, assess its current state, and ponder what the future holds.
The Problem in Healthcare Is Not the Lack of Innovation
…it is the ineptitude of healthcare leaders and digital health vendors to create a meaningful, sustainable adoption of innovative services and solutions. This article explains why this is a problem and how it can be fixed.
Telehealth in Libraries: Read a Book, See a Doc
Access to care is often hindered by a multitude of social drivers of health. Telehealth and Teleservices in libraries can address those barriers to health equity in rural and urban areas with low digital literacy or limited internet connectivity.