It's not as if office visits were ever that great. Nobody in their right mind has any love for long waiting times, paper gowns, or chilly exam rooms where you can't even get cellphone reception. Yet when the COVID-19 outbreak abruptly interrupted my own medical plans this year, I dreaded the thought of moving the process over to telemedicine. I anticipated adding to my already considerable Zoom fatigue, feeling rushed and depersonalized. What I found instead was a whole new way approach healthcare — one that might actually bring more humanity into the process, for patients and doctors alike.
Ohio legislators recently introduced H.B. 679, expanding telehealth services. As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, telehealth has become more prevalent and necessary. Ohio lawmakers realize telehealth is only going to become more widespread in the future, as patient usage and acceptance continue to grow. If enacted, H.B. 679 would expand the existing telehealth laws to apply to more providers, including psychologists, audiologists, speech pathologists, independent social workers, occupational therapists, independent chemical dependency counselors, and dieticians.
An overnight stay in a hospital can be a scary experience. Mayo Clinic Health System is using a program that’s been around since 2016 so patients with COVID-19 can manage the virus at home. Most of us don’t enjoy pulling into a hospital parking lot. We want to go in and get out a fast as possible with little worry.
Increased use of telehealth has been described as a silver lining of the COVID-19 pandemic, allowing patients who have been staying home to see their doctors via technology. But members of the Florida Board of Medicine are grappling with whether it can be used by physicians for other purposes.
Telehealth companies have been in the headlines because of recent deals, but the future of healthcare is shaping up to be a familiar brawl between Silicon Valley titans. In international relations, a proxy war is an armed conflict between two smaller groups each representing the interests of larger nations. Two recent examples saw the U.S. and Iran supporting opposing factions in Iraq in the mid-2010s and the U.S and Russia doing the same in Afghanistan during the early 1990s.
I remember the first time I listened to a lecture about the future of telehealth in pediatrics. My first thought was, “Absolutely not! This is not how I imagined practicing medicine.” For me, being a pediatrician is rooted in the relationship you build with patients and families, and telehealth didn’t seem like a platform that could support that.