The future of health care is looking virtual
January 25, 2018
By Jon Pearce
Health care in the U.S. is in a state of flux, with policymakers, insurers, health systems and individual providers all trying to address the difficulties presented by an aging population, growing physician shortage and rising health care costs.
Health care organizations now need to be strategic and innovative to make health care in the U.S. more effective – and providers are looking to technologies like virtual care to quiet these concerns.
The concept of telemedicine has taken off over the past decade and its adoption will only continue to grow, as the telemedicine market is expected to reach approximately $38 billion in 2022. The industry, including both providers and patients, considers telemedicine a next generation health care tool and the future of care delivery – a fact that frankly raises a few red flags for me. How can telemedicine be a “next generation tool” when it originated back in the 1960s as a combination of telematic modes of communication and medicine?
The inflection point in health care delivery
Telemedicine is defined as “the remote diagnosis and treatment of patients by telecommunications technology.” This traditional technology is limited to delivering care via phone and – more modernly – video consultation. “Traditional” and “telecommunications” are key descriptors for telemedicine; yet, the industry views telemedicine as groundbreaking. We are at a point of inflection though, as traditional telemedicine is rapidly evolving into virtual care. Think about it from the perspective of Charles Darwin’s Theory of Evolution: over time organisms change to better adapt to their environment, and over time technology adapts to meet its users’ needs. Just as biology has allowed us to classify species based on distinct evolutionary traits, it is critical that the industry adopts the right vernacular to define and capture this shift – from analog technologies to virtual solutions, in this digital environment.
Telemedicine and virtual care are terms used interchangeably, but there are significant differences between them. Telemedicine offers a cumbersome approach to care delivery, characterized by call centers, data stuck in silos and a crumbling economic model that doesn’t fit the rapidly changing needs of health systems today. In an era when our focus is on value and patient outcomes, traditional telemedicine is quickly showing itself to be outdated. While one-on-one calls with a physician may seem new and novel now, it’s hard to imagine that this method of care delivery will be used in the next five years, much less the next ten.
We have been using telemedicine to test-drive remote care delivery tools for 70 years. This testing has been vital because the health care industry changes slowly, but it’s finally time to take off the telemedicine training wheels. After 70 years of pilots, trials and tests, we are ready for a more mature, durable set of tools – ready for substantive change, and that change is virtual care.
Virtual care is the digital progenitor of telemedicine. Incorporating multiple care modalities, virtual care is more than just a phone call or video chat. It leverages store-and-forward technology to collect and organize patient-provided health history and symptom information, allowing clinicians to access it in real time or at a later date. Health care professionals are then able to make a diagnosis and develop a recommended treatment plan, which is sent back to the patient. Virtual care is meeting the new demands of patients and businesses by mimicking the disruptive shift Netflix brought to movie rentals. It is logical, device agnostic and data driven, with no reliance on physical objects. In order to address the industry’s head-on challenges, virtual care breaks down data silos that interrupt efficient and effective health care delivery and uncorks pent-up economic innovation in the industry.
Moving from traditional to virtual
While the telemedicine market is on the growth curve for the next 10 years, the industry is already seeing the existing technology as falling short of effectively supporting both providers and patients. Frankly, traditional telemedicine is overrated. The technology is simply not living up to the hype, by failing to address the pain points of the health care industry. When thinking about telemedicine and its capabilities, it is not that different from an in-person visit from both a patient and provider perspective. An in-person appointment can take only 10 minutes, where a video visit usually lasts 30 minutes. The patient may be in the comfort of their home, but they aren’t experiencing any other significant benefit – and the clinician is spending more time delivering care.
Virtual care removes the limitations of telemedicine by integrating an innovative approach that aligns with the patient’s life and the provider’s workflow. Patients can be treated quickly and easily from the comfort of their own home or in the office, and physicians can provide care when and where their clinical schedules allow. This enhances efficiency by enabling physicians to treat more patients in the same amount of time an in-person visit takes, and directly saving visit data into the EMR. As such, virtual care significantly reduces the clerical burden of aggregating patient data and allows physicians to spend more time focusing on patient needs, reducing a key cause of burnout and helping to mitigate the physician shortage. Speed and efficiency are only part of the equation. Physicians can feel confident they are providing high quality care, as well. Through complex, intelligent algorithms, this digital technology provides physicians with more useful, less intrusive clinical decision support, giving them the information necessary to make the best, most accurate decisions for the patient. The clinical decision support combined with curated diagnosis and treatment guidelines helps providers achieve antibiotic stewardship goals and care quality objectives. Virtual care is the perfect combination of technology and experience that surpasses the current industry’s standards without forgoing quality and efficiency.
There’s also the economic angle to consider. Traditional telemedicine is stuck in the fee-for-service world, with its transactional financial model that can’t support providers looking to grow in a value-based care environment. With virtual care, health systems are able to deliver high quality care at a low price, and also realize long-term business metrics like improved patient access, cost savings and revenue from patient acquisition and retention. Providers must look to digital technology rather than analog solutions to create new economic models that better fit into today’s health care delivery, softly killing fee-for-service one virtual visit at a time.
The future with a virtual touch
As we work to quiet the concerns of the industry and improve health care for health systems, physicians and patients, the transition from telemedicine to virtual care will be critical. The industry’s current state of uncertainty means we must look to the technologies that are proven solutions and work within the larger digital ecosystem. As the saying goes – out with the old, in with the new. Telemedicine has hit its expiration date and the future is looking virtual.
About the Author: Jon Pearce is the CEO and co-founder of Zipnosis, a virtual care company that enables health care organizations to enhance patient engagement without sacrificing quality. Pearce developed his bold vision for the industry based on experience with med-tech startup Provation Medical, a point of care procedure documentation and coding solution, and as a venture analyst before founding Zipnosis in 2008.
Health care in the U.S. is in a state of flux, with policymakers, insurers, health systems and individual providers all trying to address the difficulties presented by an aging population, growing physician shortage and rising health care costs.
Health care organizations now need to be strategic and innovative to make health care in the U.S. more effective – and providers are looking to technologies like virtual care to quiet these concerns.
The concept of telemedicine has taken off over the past decade and its adoption will only continue to grow, as the telemedicine market is expected to reach approximately $38 billion in 2022. The industry, including both providers and patients, considers telemedicine a next generation health care tool and the future of care delivery – a fact that frankly raises a few red flags for me. How can telemedicine be a “next generation tool” when it originated back in the 1960s as a combination of telematic modes of communication and medicine?
The inflection point in health care delivery
Telemedicine is defined as “the remote diagnosis and treatment of patients by telecommunications technology.” This traditional technology is limited to delivering care via phone and – more modernly – video consultation. “Traditional” and “telecommunications” are key descriptors for telemedicine; yet, the industry views telemedicine as groundbreaking. We are at a point of inflection though, as traditional telemedicine is rapidly evolving into virtual care. Think about it from the perspective of Charles Darwin’s Theory of Evolution: over time organisms change to better adapt to their environment, and over time technology adapts to meet its users’ needs. Just as biology has allowed us to classify species based on distinct evolutionary traits, it is critical that the industry adopts the right vernacular to define and capture this shift – from analog technologies to virtual solutions, in this digital environment.
Telemedicine and virtual care are terms used interchangeably, but there are significant differences between them. Telemedicine offers a cumbersome approach to care delivery, characterized by call centers, data stuck in silos and a crumbling economic model that doesn’t fit the rapidly changing needs of health systems today. In an era when our focus is on value and patient outcomes, traditional telemedicine is quickly showing itself to be outdated. While one-on-one calls with a physician may seem new and novel now, it’s hard to imagine that this method of care delivery will be used in the next five years, much less the next ten.
We have been using telemedicine to test-drive remote care delivery tools for 70 years. This testing has been vital because the health care industry changes slowly, but it’s finally time to take off the telemedicine training wheels. After 70 years of pilots, trials and tests, we are ready for a more mature, durable set of tools – ready for substantive change, and that change is virtual care.
Virtual care is the digital progenitor of telemedicine. Incorporating multiple care modalities, virtual care is more than just a phone call or video chat. It leverages store-and-forward technology to collect and organize patient-provided health history and symptom information, allowing clinicians to access it in real time or at a later date. Health care professionals are then able to make a diagnosis and develop a recommended treatment plan, which is sent back to the patient. Virtual care is meeting the new demands of patients and businesses by mimicking the disruptive shift Netflix brought to movie rentals. It is logical, device agnostic and data driven, with no reliance on physical objects. In order to address the industry’s head-on challenges, virtual care breaks down data silos that interrupt efficient and effective health care delivery and uncorks pent-up economic innovation in the industry.
Moving from traditional to virtual
While the telemedicine market is on the growth curve for the next 10 years, the industry is already seeing the existing technology as falling short of effectively supporting both providers and patients. Frankly, traditional telemedicine is overrated. The technology is simply not living up to the hype, by failing to address the pain points of the health care industry. When thinking about telemedicine and its capabilities, it is not that different from an in-person visit from both a patient and provider perspective. An in-person appointment can take only 10 minutes, where a video visit usually lasts 30 minutes. The patient may be in the comfort of their home, but they aren’t experiencing any other significant benefit – and the clinician is spending more time delivering care.
Virtual care removes the limitations of telemedicine by integrating an innovative approach that aligns with the patient’s life and the provider’s workflow. Patients can be treated quickly and easily from the comfort of their own home or in the office, and physicians can provide care when and where their clinical schedules allow. This enhances efficiency by enabling physicians to treat more patients in the same amount of time an in-person visit takes, and directly saving visit data into the EMR. As such, virtual care significantly reduces the clerical burden of aggregating patient data and allows physicians to spend more time focusing on patient needs, reducing a key cause of burnout and helping to mitigate the physician shortage. Speed and efficiency are only part of the equation. Physicians can feel confident they are providing high quality care, as well. Through complex, intelligent algorithms, this digital technology provides physicians with more useful, less intrusive clinical decision support, giving them the information necessary to make the best, most accurate decisions for the patient. The clinical decision support combined with curated diagnosis and treatment guidelines helps providers achieve antibiotic stewardship goals and care quality objectives. Virtual care is the perfect combination of technology and experience that surpasses the current industry’s standards without forgoing quality and efficiency.
There’s also the economic angle to consider. Traditional telemedicine is stuck in the fee-for-service world, with its transactional financial model that can’t support providers looking to grow in a value-based care environment. With virtual care, health systems are able to deliver high quality care at a low price, and also realize long-term business metrics like improved patient access, cost savings and revenue from patient acquisition and retention. Providers must look to digital technology rather than analog solutions to create new economic models that better fit into today’s health care delivery, softly killing fee-for-service one virtual visit at a time.
Jon Pearce
As we work to quiet the concerns of the industry and improve health care for health systems, physicians and patients, the transition from telemedicine to virtual care will be critical. The industry’s current state of uncertainty means we must look to the technologies that are proven solutions and work within the larger digital ecosystem. As the saying goes – out with the old, in with the new. Telemedicine has hit its expiration date and the future is looking virtual.
About the Author: Jon Pearce is the CEO and co-founder of Zipnosis, a virtual care company that enables health care organizations to enhance patient engagement without sacrificing quality. Pearce developed his bold vision for the industry based on experience with med-tech startup Provation Medical, a point of care procedure documentation and coding solution, and as a venture analyst before founding Zipnosis in 2008.