Doctors are using iPads to record information instead of scribbling notes on a paper pad. Nurses are browsing through electronic medical records instead of file drawers. Hospitals are adopting the cloud to store patient data so that it’s accessible to care providers anytime, anywhere.
The entire field of health care has been completely transformed by technology over the past two decades, and the results have vastly altered the manner in which both patients and health care professionals manage patients’ well-being. As health care continues to turn to technology to deliver more effective treatments, the practice of telehealth is starting to take center stage.
Telehealth, as defined by Health Resources and Services Administration, is the use of electronic information and telecommunications technologies to support long-distance clinical health care, patient and professional health-related education, public health and health administration – and it’s been around in one form or another since the modern X-ray.
But today, demand for telehealth services like video communications and remote patient monitoring is rapidly increasing as networks and infrastructure are better able to support it. Additionally, as rural care demands increase, and as agencies like Indian Health Services and the Department of Veterans Affairs need to deliver services to larger groups of patients, telehealth is being leveraged more than ever before. In fact, market research firm IHS predicted in a December 2013 study that the U.S. telehealth market will grow from $240 million in 2013 to $1.9 billion in 2018.
The telehealth market is clearly poised for explosion, and more and more agencies and health care organizations are looking for guidance as to how to best use these technologies. To help, GovLoop has partnered with Yorktel – a video managed services provider that offers telehealth technology connecting doctors, specialists and clinicians to where the patient is – to define this industry perspective.
In this industry perspective, GovLoop and Yorktel explore telehealth best practices, benefits, and what you need to know to take advantage of the next evolution in technology and health care.
