How Are Hospitals Offering Customised ‘Corporate Telehealth’ Services
Telemedicine is a novel concept of providing primary healthcare to those in need regardless of their circumstances and geographical location, bringing the doctor to the patient. Though it once seemed like a far-fetched concept, the stressor of the COVID-19 pandemic has made it a vital part of healthcare. The pandemic made physical interactions a threat, and the hospitals became the most dangerous places that a person could visit. While the conventional healthcare system did a remarkable job treating affected patients, telemedicine provided a medium for doctors and regular patients to interact safely. Telemedicine and other telehealth services ensured that those in need of healthcare had uninterrupted treatment access as quickly as possible.
Even though telemedicine gained the majority of its traction in the aftermath of the pandemic, it is in no way a solely pandemic situation. Healthcare providers and patients both have witnessed the potential of telemedicine to roll back on it. Serious steps have been taken to ensure that telemedicine shaping towards telehealth is more mainstream and normalised for all to benefit from.
Why are hospitals using telehealth as their new business model?
The potential of telemedicine became very obvious in the wake of the global pandemic. A nationwide poll conducted by the American Psychiatric Association has reported that 82 per cent of their patients experienced telemedicine for the first time during the pandemic. A confirmed 38 per cent of them have continued to use telemedicine even after the pandemic. According to McKinsey reports, there has been a 38 times higher acceptance rate and implementation of telemedicine and telehealth services across all specialties. More than 40 per cent of the users are willing to continue with telemedicine services. Most importantly, investment in virtual healthcare has witnessed a never before seen increase in the number of assets being done by venture capitalists. These are clear indicators of the growing faith and adoption of telemedicine services.
The merits of implementing telemedicine extend beyond ensuring safe and immediate healthcare to patients. There are numerous benefits for hospitals and healthcare centers in implementing telemedicine. For instance, the consultation of patients can be significantly optimised by only calling-in patients that require a more comprehensive doctor's examination. Telehealth services extend the reach of patient care irrespective of hospital location and doctors with specialities are accessible to tier 2 and tier 3 places by combining the digital power of 4G/5G, smartphone with digital payments. Telehealth services empower hospitals to think in a very different way, wherein patient and care professional doesn’t have to be at the same location which has been the basic premise of healthcare services for the last few decades. Now, it allows hospital CIOs to think differently, teleconsultation, IoT Smart Medical devices, remote monitoring, home nursing services are making the far reach accessibility of healthcare a true reality.
Another instance is implementing a virtual consult at the emergency situation which would enable hospitals to quickly access all the incoming patients and designate them more optimised, ensuring that the staff is prioritised in terms of emergency. On the whole, the implementation of telemedicine provides continuous and immediate healthcare access to patients and allows healthcare professionals more elbow room to care for their patients thoroughly. The healthcare centers can benefit from streamlined operations; this is why even post-pandemic and years to come, telehealth has to become every hospitals' business model and it has to be part of the digital solution along with their solutions such as HIMS, LIMS, RIS etc and may not be able to run thai service as a siloed service.
How are corporates are tying up with the hospitals to provide telehealth services for the betterment of their employees?
An increasing number of companies have begun to realise that to comprehensively ensure the safety of their employees, they need to provide safer healthcare access, which has resulted in the increased implementation of 'Corporate Telehealth.' Much different from providing just medical insurance for admissions care, Corporate Telehealth allows companies to offer their employees 24x7 healthcare access to services like virtual consultations, ordering & refilling prescriptions online, ambulance booking, performing lab tests, E-prescriptions and follow-up care through IoT-enabled remote patient care devices. The expenses of such services are generally borne by the company or shared between the employer and employees. This enables corporates to give their employees peace of mind so that they can focus on their work.
With the scare of COVID-19 not going anywhere soon, Corporate Telehealth ensures that the employees have access to excellent remote healthcare at a moment's notice, enabling them to work more comfortably and safely with high-pressure tasks and deadlines. From the hospital’s point of view, such services allow the hospital marketing team to sign-up one or multiple corporates and serve them from a single Health Cloud. Moreover, corporate employees get the hospital branded app to avail the services from Hospital Health Cloud. Owing to its competitive differentiation in the market, Corporate Telehealth will soon gain momentum among more hospitals and corporates alike.
Conclusion
Telehealth has enabled holistic care to be made available remotely. Regardless of the circumstances and geographical location, patients now have access to quality healthcare at the expense of a few keystrokes. The telemedicine market is projected to experience unprecedented growth of $459.8 billion in 2030, further testament to the increased traction and the widespread adoption of telemedicine as a more permanent source of healthcare.
