If there’s one thing that everyone can agree on when it comes to the Covid-19 pandemic and health IT, it’s that telehealth has gone mainstream. In addition, telemedicine services are now being reimbursed, thanks to new government legislation and consequent new restrictions from commercial payers. These factors boosted the popularity of telehealth and related technologies and services such as connected health and remote patient monitoring. As a result, investing in these areas today, as opposed to two years ago, necessitates completely different considerations.
Welcome to the third episode of Healthcare IT News’ “Health IT Investment: The Next Five Years” feature series. Telehealth, connected health, and remote patient monitoring are the topics of this third section. Here, we speak with health IT leaders, primarily CIOs, to learn about their investment priorities in six categories: AI and machine learning; interoperability; telehealth, connected health, remote patient monitoring; cybersecurity; electronic health records and population health; and emerging technology and other systems.
Mistretta of Virginia Hospital Center warns that the future of the telehealth business is uncertain, as long-term reimbursement trends will determine it. Telehealth, he feels, will be a realistic choice. Telehealth visits have stayed at 25% of Virginia Hospital Center visits after the enormous surges of 2020. Unless the reimbursement changes, he expects that to keep up the same.
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