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10 Hartford Business Journal • August 5, 2019 • www.HartfordBusiness.com By Matt Pilon mpilon@hartfordbusiness.com I n the days following an opioid overdose, making sure a pa- tient sticks with withdrawal- symptoms medication can help prevent a relapse. To ensure that happens, or at least increase the likelihood, Hartford Health- Care's Rushford Center recently started using follow-up video calls with overdose patients to assess them and prescribe a refill, if necessary, as soon as possible. "It's really crucial to catch someone while they're ready," said Dr. J. Craig Al- len, medical director of Rushford, which provides inpatient and outpatient addic- tion and mental health treatment. While Rushford's virtual-visit volume remains small for now, Allen said he sees potential for ramping it up soon, with a particular eye toward eastern Connecticut, where the care provider has fewer physicians to see patients. "This is one of the waves of the fu- ture, absolutely," he said. Spurred by more favorable state laws, Connecticut's healthcare industry, ranging from hospitals and urgent-care clinics to physician practices and com- munity health centers, is increasingly using and experimenting with virtual doctor-patient visits and consults be- tween fellow health providers. Insur- ance coverage for so-called telehealth services has also become more common, since state lawmakers in 2015 demand- ed parity between in-person and virtual healthcare services. Commercial insurance claims for telehealth services in Connecticut grew 91 percent between 2014 and 2018, according to Fair Health, a New York-based nonprofit that collects and analyzes health insurance claims. However, that pales in comparison to the rest of the country, which aver- aged 626 percent growth in telehealth claims over that period. As of 2018, telehealth services — though a very small portion of overall health claims — were nearly five times as common nationally than they were in Connecticut, comprising 0.14 per- cent of total claims in the U.S., com- pared to Connecticut's 0.03 percent. Competition heats up in urgent care One of the healthcare niches lo- cally that's been particularly active in adopting telehealth services is urgent- care facilities. Last month, pharmacy giant CVS Health, which already has been compet- ing with urgent- care providers with its in-store MinuteClinics, announced its em- ployed and con- tracted providers will start provid- ing virtual visits for Connecticut patients through the CVS Pharmacy mobile app. Meanwhile, CVS competitor Wal- greens is already offering telehealth services in Connecticut through ar- rangements between MDLIVE and Der- matologistOnCall, and Rite Aid is work- ing with a company called InTouch Health to roll out in-store telehealth kiosks, though the company hasn't said when kiosks might appear here. Meantime, GoHealth Urgent Care's nearly 20 Connecticut locations, which are a joint venture with Hartford HealthCare, began offering virtual visits nearly a year ago. "It's a matter of getting in [the mar- ket], getting your name out there and doing it well," said Dr. Jason Kurtzman, who sees patients both virtually and in person for GoHealth Urgent Care. Different providers will have varying comfort levels with seeing patients via video screen, Kurtzman said, but he has Virtual Care Telehealth gains traction in CT, but hurdles remain IMAGE | JU JAE-YOUNG, SHUTTERSTOCK.COM Dr. Jason Kurtzman, Physician, GoHealth Urgent Care Telehealth growth in Connecticut Data from Fair Health show a growing prevalence of telehealth services among overall commercial insurance claims filed in Connecticut. While the number of telehealth insurance claims grew nearly 91 percent here between 2014 and 2018, the national growth rate was 625 percent. 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 0.000 0.005 0.010 0.015 0.020 0.025 0.030 Telehealth claims 0.0149% 0.0181% 0.0222% 0.0184% 0.0283% *Telehealth claims as a % of all commercial medical claims Source: Fair Haven