We believe that Heroes of Doxy.me is a very important project, and there are a number of goals we hope to accomplish. But first, we should explain why we loved the people of Ukraine long before this war began.

What is Ukraine to doxy.me? 

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit American shores in March 2020, doxy.me grew at an insanely fast rate. It was impossible for the small team of employees to keep up with the flood of new users. That’s when Heath Morrison—our current CTO, and an American who had lived in Ukraine for many years—suggested expanding into the Ukrainian talent pool. 

When the world most needed telemedicine to grow and adapt to solve its healthcare needs, the people of Ukraine answered the call. We hired software engineers, project managers, support specialists; Ukrainians were involved in every part of the company. They made it possible for hundreds of thousands of providers to join doxy.me in the matter of only a few short months—sometimes tens of thousands a day. Without them, millions of patients would have been left with no safe way to see their providers. The people of Ukraine have done so much for us: that’s why we want to do everything we can to give back to them. 

Spread truth and bolster support

These stories are real. In them you will find struggle and hope. The will of the Ukrainian people is an amazing thing. We American workers have witnessed it firsthand in every interaction with our colleagues. We want to show the rest of the world just how special and resilient the people of Ukraine are.

Our Ukrainian friends have had to hunker down in bomb shelters and subway stations; have had to split families as they crossed borders; have been held at gunpoint by Russian soldiers. They have gone through so much—that’s why we plan on doing more than just sharing these stories with the world. 

Charity effort

Heroes of Doxy.me is a charity effort for the people of Ukraine. All proceeds from sales of our “We Stand with Ukraine” t-shirts, available in the doxy.me store, go to charitable causes and organizations hand-selected by our Ukrainian colleagues. We believe it is not the role of outsiders to decide what is best for the people of Ukraine, so we have listened to their wishes. Additionally, any charitable donation made by a doxy.me employee will be matched by the company. 

The people of Ukraine supported doxy.me, and by extension, hundreds of thousands of healthcare providers around the world. It is our time to give back to them. 

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The best ways to customize your online waiting room

The doxy.me customizable waiting room feature is very versatile, so I wanted to talk about a few different ways to take full advantage of its capabilities. 

Bio

A provider bio is one of the most popular choices. Simply include a picture and information about yourself. While a bio may make introductions easier, it also has the added benefit of showing your patient that they’re in the right place. If you want to take it up a notch, you can even create a video that introduces yourself (just note that the video must be posted on YouTube or Vimeo).

Pre-session tasks

Would your telehealth sessions run smoother if you had your clients perform some pre-session tasks? Here are some examples:

• Do you have forms that need to be filled out? Include a link to an online form with some text instructions on your page, or connect with dokbot to automate patient intake and data collection.
• Explain what the session will involve so clients can prepare properly, including grabbing equipment, changing clothes, etc.
• Instruct your clients to perform a connection test using doxybot. This will prepare them for the technical aspects of the telemedicine call. 
• Perhaps you’re a mental healthcare provider, and you like your clients to perform a guided meditation before the session. You can put a video right in your waiting room. 

And there could be hundreds of other discipline-specific examples too. Just remind your clients to show up early enough to finish these tasks before the call starts.

Create a relaxing environment

A relaxing environment can improve patient outcomes in hospital settings. So why not make your waiting room a place where your clients can relax and decompress? By adding a YouTube video, you can play music or share ambient nature scenes with your patients before a call. 

Education

The waiting room is a perfect place to teach. Much like many brick-and-mortar offices hang posters and The waiting room is a perfect place to teach. Like the posters and diagrams hanging on the walls in brick-and-mortar offices, you can inform clients about the common ailments in your field. Here are just a few examples:

• Sleep doctors can include information about sleep apnea 
• Endocrinologists can include information on diabetes 
• Orthopedists can describe common joint injuries

And it doesn’t have to be educational in these same ways, either. You could inform them about what your field of study is, common reasons to see a provider like you, or even what the capital of Assyria was. The waiting room is your place to share anything.

Your waiting room could look like this too.

Benefits to editing your online waiting room

What benefits will you gain from a well-constructed waiting room? 

• Confident clients
• Informed patients
• More time, less effort

So what are you waiting for? Log in to your account and get started on your perfect online waiting room today.

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Put simply, the therapeutic alliance is a description of the interactions between a therapist and their client. It is considered an essential part of the therapeutic process that greatly affects treatment outcomes. The typical goal of a therapeutic alliance is to increase patient engagement by establishing the therapist as a facilitator for the client to reach their goals. A good alliance makes the two feel more like equals than like a patient and an authority figure. 

(SAARA DELETE THIS TEXT AND PUT THE LINK ON “patient engagement” IN THE PARAGRAPH ABOVE)

The therapeutic alliance is also why many therapists have stayed away from teletherapy for so long. There’s a prevailing belief that telehealth inhibits the alliance, but how true is that claim? 

The therapeutic alliance—the biggest perceived barrier to teletherapy

This topic, establishing a good relationship with a client over telehealth, has come up many times on the Telehealth Heroes Podcast. Many mental health care professionals expressed their initial doubts. 

“The relationship, the interaction in the room is critically important. And that’s the reason why I was opposed to the very idea of teletherapy for many years.”

–Dr. Chapman 

“…I was leery [of telehealth] because the in-person contact is so crucial. New research in 2021 is saying 95% of communication is non-verbals.”

–Dr. Campinha-Bacote 

Check out their podcast episodes for the full stories.

However, both of these speakers said they later achieved great success with teletherapy once they incorporated it into their practices. Furthermore, some research suggests that teletherapy is actually beneficial for the therapeutic alliance.

“Historically, the uptake of videotherapy has been hindered by psychotherapist expectations of inferior therapeutic alliance and outcomes, in spite of considerable research evidence to the contrary. Research suggests that videotherapy provides a powerful pathway for clients to experience enhanced opportunities for self‐expression, connection and intimacy.” (Simpson et al., 2020)

Still, you, a mental healthcare professional, know how to establish a therapeutic alliance, but now you need to figure out how to do it during a telehealth call. Let’s examine what techniques you can use during a telehealth call to facilitate the creation of a strong therapeutic alliance. 

Creating a strong therapeutic alliance over telehealth

Many of the in-person techniques you use to create a therapeutic alliance are still largely available to you during a telehealth call. In addition, here is a list of unique-to-telehealth techniques to improve the therapeutic alliance.

• Enhance communication through intentional expressions of empathy, like leaning in to the screen, facial expressions, and voice tone 
• Encourage clients to play around with the video settings, zooming in or out until they find a comfortable virtual distance
• Use features like Picture-in-picture to imitate eye contact by moving the client’s image to be directly under your webcam (also check out this article on creative ways to use PiP) 
• Incorporate a feedback form into your online practice, allowing the client to provide helpful feedback in a non-confrontational format 

Conclusion 

The therapeutic alliance is not as big a barrier to teletherapy as psychotherapists once assumed it was, and telehealth has massive potential to improve patient outcomes in mental health practices. So try out these techniques in your teletherapy sessions if you haven’t already, and see if they work for you or your clients. And, of course, sign up for doxy.me to use the free telemedicine platform loved by therapists worldwide.

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First of all, there are a few grounds on which this rivalry stands: those are the different tiers of subscriptions. 

Free 

When it comes to the free tiers, there are already a few huge differences. Free Zoom has access to many great video conferencing features right out of the gate: HD video, group calling, screen share, and a white board feature. All of these features are unavailable in the free version of doxy.me. However, these all come with a HUGE caveat: Zoom’s free version is not HIPAA compliant. 

That’s right, it is not HIPAA compliant. If you are a provider trying to use Zoom for medical appointments, the free version of Zoom is putting you and your practice at legal risk. The other big advantage of doxy.me’s free subscription is unlimited call time. The free version of Zoom lets one-on-one meetings last for up to 30 hours which, while technically not unlimited, is good enough. However, if you want those group calls to last more than forty minutes, you’ll need to upgrade. 

Paid 

The paid subscriptions for both services change many things. Doxy.me gains the HD and group calls that are lacking from the free version, and Zoom becomes HIPAA compliant with the Zoom for Healthcare subscription. Honestly, both platforms gain so many features in the paid subscriptions that trying to represent them fairly in a table is arbitrary. I instead recommend checking out these two pages for information about what the different subscriptions have to offer: doxy.me and Zoom for Healthcare. 

However, here are the two major advantages each platform has over the other.

Zoom has more features

As far as total number of features, Zoom has more, plain and simple. Not all of them are super important for healthcare, but some are great supplements. That said, doxy.me also has many of the most important high-tier features: things like EHR integrations, payments through the service, customizable waiting rooms (though Zoom’s customization is very limited compared to doxy.me’s). 

However, Zoom shines in its ability to integrate with medical devices for remote monitoring. If you absolutely need some kind of remote monitoring device that you need to operate instead of your patient, Zoom may be the right choice for you—just make sure they actually have the integration you need. Zoom has a few other features that doxy.me doesn’t (like built-in recording and transcriptions), but those aren’t as large of a gap as the medical device integrations. With doxy.me, third parties make things like recording sessions pretty simple. 

At doxy.me, if we could snap our fingers and suddenly have all the capabilities of Zoom, we probably would. However, reality is not so simple. They are a massive platform with more funding and more resources. Doxy.me cannot afford to integrate all the same capabilities that Zoom adds at the same speed. That’s why doxy.me’s philosophy is to only pay attention to what matters in the world of healthcare. At the end of the day, doxy.me is only focused on healthcare: the providers and their patients. 

Doxy.me has the service, personalization, and focus on healthcare

At the high levels, it feels like the company’s missions are the big difference. Zoom is the giant video conferencing organization that focuses on business. Doxy.me is the telehealth platform that focuses on healthcare. How do these differences manifest? 

• Simplicity—At doxy.me, we understand the demands of the healthcare system. Healthcare providers are some of the hardest working people on the planet, and we don’t want anything to get in the way of their care. That’s why doxy.me is extremely easy to set up and use. 
• World class support—Zoom is also easy to set up, but they boast about not having an onboarding team. If doxy.me is simple to set up, why do we have a customer success team and an Enterprise onboarding team? Because we know the hospital environment is stressful. Healthcare providers and admins are busy people who, in many cases, don’t have experience with webpage building, marketing, or branding. That’s why our Clinic and Enterprise teams will handle those challenges for you. 
• Perfect for patients—For patients preparing to have a telehealth call, the most important question is “how do I join the call?” Both doxy.me and Zoom have link invites, text or email invitations, and permanent, editable waiting room links. The big difference? Your doxy.me waiting room URL can include your or your clinic’s name. It’s super easy, and it comes automatically with any doxy.me account, even a free one. With a Zoom paid account, you can set up a permanent meeting room—but you need to go into your settings, create a ten digit code, and voilà! For your patients, imagine the comfort of seeing your name in a URL instead of a random string of numbers, ensuring they have the right place.

An eye on the future of healthcare

For doxy.me, the focus is and always will be healthcare. Even if you prefer Zoom now (which you’re allowed to do!) we will continue to work with the future of healthcare in mind. The only people we listen to are providers and patients: we will never consider the demands of unrelated fields. And we will never stop improving the ultimate telehealth experience.

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Noise pollution in hospitals is a growing problem, and one that regularly impacts patients’ recovery experience. Clearly HHCS are solving an important problem in healthcare, but am I right to call the C.A.R.E. Channel a telehealth service? 

Certainly it is not a platform for doctors to communicate with their patients, like doxy.me, and it isn’t an educational service, either. However, Healing HealthCare Systems have published many whitepapers, eBooks, and articles about the effect of noise in hospital systems, making them an educational resource, though one aimed more at healthcare professionals than at patients. Furthermore, HHCS has expanded to having at-home programming and even a virtual reality channel. These expansions have moved the C.A.R.E. Channel firmly into the realm of telehealth. They now bring the healing environment directly to the patient’s homes. 

A chat with cofounder Susan Mazer, PhD

We were fortunate enough to have Susan Mazer on as a guest for the Telehealth Heroes Podcast. In her episode, to be released in the second season of our podcast, she talked about creating the original music and programming with her husband and fellow musician, Dallas Smith. 

The initial idea for HHCS came from a nurse friend who asked Susan, “What can I do for my patients at three in the morning when I’m not there?” Looking around the hospital, they realized there was a television in every patient room. They set about creating a way to bring tranquility to the televisions of hospitals around the world. Thus was born Healing HealthCare Systems. 

However, Susan brought up a problem she has with doxy.me during the podcast episode: we don’t have relaxing programming like the C.A.R.E. Channel playing in our virtual waiting rooms. She believed if we did, it would greatly improve the patient’s experience while waiting for a virtual visit. 

But here’s the kicker: you actually can set up a peaceful listening environment in your doxy.me waiting room right now.

Bringing peace to your doxy.me waiting room

With the Edit Waiting Room feature—available to all professional-level subscriptions and above—you can bring a peaceful environment to your doxy.me waiting room. You can add video links from YouTube or Vimeo and they will embed directly into your page, giving patients the option to watch and listen while they wait. This can bring relaxation to your patients, as well as give them something to do while they wait. For a guide on the Edit Waiting Room feature, check out our help article.

For the time being, you cannot stream the C.A.R.E. Channel through doxy.me since their videos are not hosted on YouTube or Vimeo. However, there is a great selection of ambient noise, instrumental music, and calming nature sounds available freely on YouTube. Be sure to look around and try out a few videos. You can change your waiting room again whenever you like, and it only takes a few seconds. If you really wanted to go above and beyond, you could even update the videos in your waiting room on a regular basis to keep them fresh for your patients. 

The post The C.A.R.E. Channel: a Unique Format for Telehealth  appeared first on Doxy.me.

Artificial Intelligence 

Artificial Intelligence is making huge waves in the world of heart disease diagnosis. AI-based solutions are difficult to create, but once they have a sufficient sample of data, they can become incredibly refined tools for heart health diagnostics. 

Existing examples include Anura, an app that measures things like blood pressure, stress index, and heart rate using a 30 second selfie. Also, this study done by University of Utah Health scientists examined the possibility of an AI predicting the onset of cardiovascular diseases by looking through a patient’s health records. The scientists believe their findings have greater implications for all types of diagnoses, though they only tested for cardiovascular diseases in this study. 

As AI technology improves in the future, we can expect the uses to become broader, and the results to become more refined. 

Remote monitoring

Remote patient monitoring allows patients to track their heart health over time without constant doctor visits. Items like smart watches have become very popular tools for tracking health statistics, but there is still plenty of potential for them to improve. This study shows just how valuable remote monitoring can be for providing scalable cardiovascular care. 

Also check out the article I wrote earlier this month for more information on remote monitoring and telehealth for heart care.

Affordability

There are different types of innovation: some organizations are making disruptive innovations to heart health tech, like Ilara Health. They have made common diagnostic tools affordably available to millions of people in many countries across Africa. 

As a trend, affordability applies to all of the other technologies listed in this article; the further into the future we look, the more accessible these technologies will become. 

VR and AR 

Virtual reality and augmented reality both have massive potential for education. However, what’s more amazing is the ability of VR/AR to help surgeons plan for complex congenital heart disease surgeries. “Virtual reality (VR) allows for interactive manipulation of high-resolution representations of patient-specific imaging data.” The interactive manipulation allows surgeons to run simulations of the surgery without having to actually work on the patient. The study above found that VR was a feasible solution with existing imaging data. 

According to the CDC, only about 75% of babies with severe congenital heart defects survive until the age of one. If this technology improved these surgeries, it would combat a leading cause of neonatal deaths in the United States.

The future of health tech

The history of medicine includes massive advancements of all kinds. New procedures, new laws, and new technologies are all factors that lead to better patient outcomes. Policy makers, scientists, engineers, and doctors all push forward in pursuit of a healthier world for everyone. The advancements in heart health are just a small facet of the changes being made across the entire healthcare landscape. 

At doxy.me, our little corner of the industry is telemedicine. We’ve made our bet on a future where patients of all kinds can see their providers and receive top quality care from anywhere. If you also believe in this vision, consider signing up for doxy.me for free today.

The post Future of Cardiac Technology Integrations appeared first on Doxy.me.

Private practice providers use telehealth to deliver care their way

Many of our guests from the first season run private practices. Here are some of our favorite moments from providers talking about the freedom telehealth has given them and their colleagues.

In this clip, Psychologist Dr. Laura Forsyth relates a moment when—after having a very emotional telehealth session with a patient—she got to walk outside of her beach house and soak in a beautiful, healing view. 

Endocrinologist Dr. Medhavi Jogi

“Why would you work for me versus a large corporation? Well, it’s because you want to have control of your own destiny, of what your time is like and how you treat patients as much as you can.” 

People in informatics are nerds 

Host Brandon Welch has a PhD in informatics, just like his guest Dr. Anthony Dunnigan. The clip speaks for itself. 

Telehealth comes in all shapes and sizes 

Telehealth Van is an amazing company that uses vans—equipped with wifi, laptops, and other devices—to bring telehealth to underserved people in Los Angeles county. Listen to founder Dion Rambo discuss the problems they needed to overcome when devising the original plan for the Telehealth Van. 

Telehealth makes a big difference for the vulnerable and underprivileged 

Many of our providers work with underprivileged patients. Telehealth helps overcome so many barriers to access for the people who need care the most.

In this clip, Dion Rambo talks about his experience riding along on the first Telehealth Van visit. That very first visit proved to him just how important the work was. 

Dr. Darius Campinha Bacote works with the Dallas County Juvenile Department and the local VA. He shared a story about a client who was a victim of military sexual trauma, and who never would have received care without telehealth: 

“I talked with a woman who said, ‘I couldn’t. When I saw that your name was Darius, I knew that was a male. And I had been sexually assaulted by a male. I didn’t want to see you. Now that it’s telehealth, I’m able to move the camera, I’m able to not look.’ I don’t know how I can say that more importantly. There’s no way this woman would have done this, [telehealth] was the only method for her.” 

Telehealth keeps getting bigger

Still have doubts about the potential for telehealth in the future? I don’t know why you would, because all of the big names have entered the game: Google, Microsoft, and most recently, Amazon (and a little company called doxy.me is still doing pretty well, too). During Season 1, we got to talk with a couple of people in huge telehealth-centered organizations. 

In this clip, Dr. Tania Elliott, current Chief Medical Officer of Virtual Care at Ascension and former Medical Director of Doctor On Demand, relates a humorous story about her mother, Dr. Phil, and the founding of Doctor on Demand.

Dr. David Mou, Chief Medical Officer of Cerebral

“…And so all of that has allowed us to become literally the fastest growing healthcare company ever. Within two years, around 21 months, we were able to go from zero patients to 200,000 patients in all 50 states and the UK… But we are closing a $300 million round in the coming weeks. And we’re hoping to become the global leader in tele-mental health.”

Telehealth is kind of like Star Wars 

Do you agree with Dr. Jogi? 

Even still, we haven’t achieved equity: but some people are working hard to change that

Even though telehealth overcomes many barriers to access, it has a few challenges of its own to face. Organizations like Palmetto Care Connections and Telehealth Van are taking huge steps to increase equity for rural areas and underprivileged people. Listen to Kathy Schwarting of Palmetto Care Connections talk about the future of broadband in South Carolina.

These amazing heroes have done so much for the world of healthcare and telehealth. If you want to hear their full stories, check out the Telehealth Heroes Podcast.

Or listen on your favorite podcasting apps:
Apple

Spotify

The post Top 7 Takeaways from Telehealth Heroes Season 1 appeared first on Doxy.me.

In the 58 years since American Heart Month was founded, great progress has been made in the understanding and treatment of heart disease. And, with the major uptake of telehealth at the onset of the pandemic in 2020, heart health may already have its biggest key to success in the future. However, first we need to understand why heart health is still important in the age of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Effect of the pandemic on heart health

The Covid-19 pandemic has been the major health concern on the minds of Americans for the past two years. February has come along to remind us all that, despite seemingly daily increases in Covid-19-related deaths, heart disease remains the number one killer of Americans. In 2020, heart disease killed nearly twice as many Americans as Covid-19 (though the numbers were much closer in 2021). The most disturbing fact of the matter—the pandemic has actually worsened the heart health of America. Here are a few factors to explain why: 

• Covid-19: the disease can attack the heart and blood directly. Patients who had severe Covid cases are especially vulnerable—they may find themselves with permanent heart damage. This article from Johns Hopkins Medicine discusses the many ways Covid-19 may affect the heart.
• Quarantine-facilitated unhealthy lifestyle behaviors: it’s very easy to pick up or return to unhealthy behaviors in isolation. Poor dieting, lack of exercise, and stress are all factors that contribute to heart disease. 
• Less access to doctors/hospitals: many patients are still staying away from hospitals for fear of contracting Covid-19. Even worse, many hospitals are overrun with Covid-19 patients, making it difficult for patients to gain access to care. 

Why telehealth and remote monitoring are the future of heart healthcare

Telehealth

As stated earlier, access to quality care is one of the biggest struggles for heart health during the Covid-19 pandemic. Telemedicine greatly increases access to care by overcoming barriers like time, distance, and cost (as well as providing a slew of other benefits for patients and providers). Furthermore, telemedicine is the perfect medium for one of the most important but often overlooked facets of heart disease treatment—continuous preventive medicine counseling. “Prevention is better than cure” is a popular proverb in medicine, and it’s especially true in cardiovascular health. Telemedicine makes these counseling sessions much more accessible to patients and a much smaller burden for providers. 

Remote patient monitoring

As for remote patient monitoring, there are already several technologies and devices available. There are remote devices on the market that can measure hypertension and track arrhythmias. Some of them even come in the form of watches! Right now, these technologies are more accessible and convenient than they’ve ever been. Using these devices, patients can monitor their own heart health at home, allowing them to reach out to their provider as soon as a problem arises. 

The combination of telehealth and remote patient monitoring creates a system for continuous heart health that is far superior to the in-person model. A health routine based on these two systems would save time and money for hospitals and patients, and would make it easier to track progress toward heart health goals. As telemedicine platforms and monitoring technologies continue to evolve, the future of heart health looks bright. Perhaps, one day, the meaning of American Heart Month will change forever. 

If you’re a cardiologist who thinks the time is right to get into telemedicine, check out if doxy.me is right for you.

The post Heart Health: Are Remote Care and Telehealth the Solutions? appeared first on Doxy.me.

While we may not know when the PHE due to COVID-19 will finally end, other telehealth-related news and trends are slightly more predictable. Here’s what you can expect for telehealth in 2022. 

Top 3 trends to expect

Hybrid model, fewer calls 

Since the telehealth boom of early 2020, doxy.me’s total number of providers on the platform has increased, but the average number of virtual visits per provider dropped significantly in 2021. In 2020, quarantine restrictions forced many providers to take their practices online. Providers were using virtual visits for a huge percentage of their total visits. However, quarantine restrictions in most areas across the United States were much less severe in 2021, allowing practices to return to in-person care. 

What we’re seeing is the shift to a hybrid model of healthcare. Providers are now using telehealth to supplement their in-person practice instead of replace it (like many were forced to do in 2020). We expect more and more providers to adopt this hybrid model of healthcare in the future. Therefore, we will continue to see a decrease in the average number of telehealth visits per provider until an equilibrium between virtual and in-person visits is reached.

More advanced telehealth integrations and hospital care in the home

Speaking of the hybrid healthcare model, get ready for more advanced telehealth integrations to continue improving the quality of care that patients receive in their own homes. There are many Medicare-approved acute hospital care at home facilities, and we expect this number to increase. Systems and startups looking to further improve hospital care at home are also starting to appear, and some are even gaining venture capital. 

Expect more startups to appear with plans to improve healthcare in the home, and expect telehealth companies to continue improving their products to more closely match in-person care.

Demand from patients 

The numbers are in: patients want to continue using telehealth in the future. According to this survey, the patient population that wants to continue using telehealth is far larger than the inverse. Users were asked if they planned to continue using telehealth in the future, with the answer options being yes, no, or not sure. More than 50% of the baby boomer population surveyed—who were the least likely to want to continue using telehealth services—responded yes. On the opposite end, 83% of the surveyed millennial population responded yes.

We expect patient approval rates of telehealth to keep increasing in 2022. More providers may start using telehealth services if their patients continue to demand it. 

Top 3 most anticipated policy changes

The Telehealth Modernization Act of 2021

The Telehealth Modernization Act of 2021 is the bill that could have the biggest impact on the future of telehealth in 2022. The main goal of the Telehealth Modernization Act of 2021 is to expand access to Telehealth Services in the Medicare program. If passed, it would: 

• Lift geographical restrictions on telehealth 
• Allow all types of healthcare practitioners to provide telehealth services

These changes are huge. Urban areas would finally have permanent reimbursement for telehealth services, and any healthcare facility could act as an originating site. Not to mention that allowing reimbursement for all provider types would massively expand the reach of telehealth services. This bill has a lot of momentum, with 18 cosponsors in Congress already. 

The Telehealth Extension Act is a good runner up. It covers many of the same topics as the Telehealth Modernization Act, but is ultimately not as inclusive as the former bill. Its biggest advantage over the modernization act is the physical support it would bring to creating telehealth access in underserved communities. The extension act also has a lot of bipartisan support, with more than 30 cosponsors for the bill. 

The Cures 2.0 Act 

The Cures 2.0 Act is a massive bill created to make changes across many areas of healthcare policy, education, and research. As it relates to telehealth, these are its main goals: 

• Bring telehealth access to Medicaid and Children’s Health Insurance Program 
• Extending Medicare’s current telehealth flexibilities and leniencies under the PHE

Much like the Telehealth Modernization Act of 2021, this bill wants to increase telehealth access. There are many overlaps in the policy for both of these bills, but extending telehealth coverage to more national insurance programs is the big differentiator. If both bills passed, geography and socioeconomic status would become much smaller barriers to telehealthcare. 

The CONNECT for Health Act 

The CONNECT for Health Act seeks to remove many restrictions on telehealth and remote patient monitoring (RPM). Its biggest goals are: 

• Remove reimbursement restraints related to telehealth and RPM 
• Permit the use of RPM on patients with certain chronic conditions
• Add these sites to the list of covered originating sites: 
  • Telestroke evaluation and management sites
  • Native American health service facilities
  • Dialysis facilities 

Remote patient monitoring is a very important subset of telehealth. If it had greater flexibility, it would save a huge amount of time and money for the healthcare system. In regards to the covered patients, they would be monitored in their own homes instead of a hospital—a solution that brings just as much relief to the patients as it does to the overcrowded hospitals they are leaving behind. 

The need for better telehealth policy 

While the CMS is constantly evaluating which practices should receive reimbursement for telehealth services, the process is slow. Any of these bills passing would be a huge victory for telehealth, but none of them would win the fight for equity alone. The American Telemed Association (ATA) has launched their own advocacy group, found here. If you want to see greater telehealth equity, consider joining.

And, if you want to stay ahead of the trends, join doxy.me—the most trusted free, simple, and secure telemedicine solution.

The post Telehealth Trends and Policies to Expect in 2022 appeared first on Doxy.me.

States with most total telehealth calls 2021

California was at the top with just over 8,000,000 calls, while Michigan notched over 3,000,000 calls in the tenth spot. These numbers aren’t surprising at all: seven of the top ten states-by-calls also fall into the top ten most populated states. The three states not in the top ten were Massachusetts (16th in population size), New Jersey (11th), and Virginia (12th). So, to make things more interesting, we looked at the top ten (and bottom ten) states by calls per capita.

States with most and fewest telehealth calls per capita 2021

Vermont takes the top spot with a massive 0.683 calls per capita. On the opposite end, Mississippi only had 0.055 calls per capita. So what’s the difference between these two states when it comes to practicing telehealth? To find out why some states hosted so many more calls than others, we looked at a few different variables.

State policy effect on telehealth usage

The top ten

As of November 2021, seven of the top ten states in calls per capita have legislation supported by the American Telemed Association (ATA). Check out the ATA’s state policy tracker at their website.

Surprisingly, the three states that don’t are Vermont, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire: three of the top four on the list. Why might that be? 

• Vermont: has full service and payment parity, though the payment parity is set to be repealed in 2026.
• Massachusetts: only has full payment parity for behavioral health services. 
• New Hampshire: has both payment and service parity. 

This information taken from the Center for Connected Health Policy (CCHP). 

What do we mean by service and payment parity? Parity laws legally require private insurers to cover and reimburse telehealth services as if they were performed in-person. Service parity means an insured face-to-face service performed over telehealth must also be insured. Payment parity means the two services must be reimbursed equally. (Important note: many private payers reimburse for telehealth services anyway, even when not legally required.)

What this means is all of the states in the top ten have substantial telehealth parity laws, including Massachusetts, even though its laws only cover behavioral health. After all, the top three classifications of doxy.me providers (by number of users) fall into the behavioral health category: counselors, social workers, and psychologists.

The bottom ten

Of the ten states at the bottom of calls per capita, only four of them have ATA-supported legislation: North Dakota, Louisiana, South Dakota, and Indiana. Of the six states without ATA-supported legislation, three of them have no payment parity for telehealth: Alabama, Mississippi, and Wyoming. The other three have different forms of limited parity: West Virginia, Louisiana, and Wisconsin. 

This disparity between the policies of the top ten and bottom ten states paints a clear picture. Telehealth parity laws make a huge difference in the amount of telehealth practiced.

Rurality effect on telehealth usage

Many organizations and providers consider telehealth a sort of equalizer for rural patients. Telemedicine cuts down travel times and costs, and makes it easier for patients in rural areas to see their healthcare providers. According to the most recent urban/rural census data, last collected in the decennial census from 2010, seven of the top ten most rural states (by percentage of population living in rural areas) appeared on one of these lists. The two most rural states, Maine and Vermont, were at the top of the calls per capita list. However, North Dakota, South Dakota, Alabama, Mississippi, and West Virginia all landed on the list of lowest calls per capita. 

Maine and Vermont show that telehealth has great potential to succeed in rural areas. Remember that these two states currently have excellent parity laws. However, Alabama, Mississippi, and West Virginia have some of the worst parity laws at the time of writing this article. These findings show telehealth has great potential to succeed in rural areas, but only if supported by the proper legislation.

Median household income effect on telehealth usage

Average median household income: 

• Top ten calls per capita states-$76,775
• Bottom ten calls per capita states- $57,156

The top ten states in calls per capita have a median household income almost $20,000 higher than the bottom ten states in calls per capita. Furthermore, the four states with the highest household income were in the top calls per capita list, while four of the five states with the lowest household income were in the bottom ten of the calls per capita list. These findings show a distinct inequity between the United States’ highest and lowest earners when it comes to receiving care through telehealth.

Why might low income households have a harder time receiving care through telehealth? Low income households are less likely to be able to afford private health insurance. Without private health insurance, these households may be unable to pay for healthcare visits, regardless of telehealth or in-person care.

Furthermore, low income and rural areas often have less access to good broadband. Broadband is one of the biggest remaining barriers for telehealth to overcome, as weak broadband causes problems like poor call quality and dropped calls. There are many organizations around the country trying to fight broadband inequity in different ways: companies like Palmetto Care Connections in South Carolina and Telehealth Van in California. 

Check out these two episodes of the Telehealth Heroes Podcast to learn more about these amazing companies: “Bringing Broadband and Telehealth To Rural South Carolina with Kathy Schwarting” and “Delivering Healthcare to your Door with Telehealth Van and Dion Rambo.”

What this all means

At the state level, we’ve learned that parity laws and median household income both have a positive correlation with number of telehealth calls made. One of the principles doxy.me was founded upon is “cost shouldn’t be a barrier to telemedicine.” That’s why doxy.me is free for providers and always will be. 

However, we can’t overcome the price barrier to telehealthcare by ourselves. Without legislation changes that both improve telehealth parity and include Medicaid coverage to support low-income families, access to affordable telehealthcare will never reach its full potential in the United States. Consider joining the Physician’s Grassroots Network to advocate for policy change around the country.

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