Health

10 HE ALTH • Summer 2020 • By Grant Welker e coronavirus pandemic has forced patients and providers to rapidly expand their use and comfort level with virtual visits TELEHEALTH is here to stay I n a f lash this spring, Reliant Medical Group was suddenly using video and phone technology to have patients meet with health providers for about a quarter of the visits that used to take place in person. It wasn't just Worcester-based Reliant wasn't using telehealth much before. It wasn't at all. The company had only done a pilot program with older patients to see how well technol- ogy could be used with patients who might have a harder time making it to a doctor's office. With the coronavirus pandemic, of course, Reliant and healthcare provid- ers everywhere were forced to quickly change course. "We literally turned this on in two days," said Dr. Larry Garber, Reliant's medical director for informatics. Just like that, 500 providers have used telehealth to meet electronically with patients, he said. "It was thrust upon them very quick- ly, and they adapted to it," Garber said. The same could be said for practitioners and patients virtually everywhere during a time when it suddenly wasn't advisable to go to a doctor's office unless absolutely needed. In UMass Memorial Medical Center's outpatient services, 23,000 to 25,000 telehealth appointments were conducted in May alone. That's up from just about 40 over a whole year before – a rate of about one for every 30,000 appointments. Now, healthcare leaders in Central Massachusetts who oversee such details are looking ahead to see how much telehealth is here to stay. "I'd love to know the answer to that question, as would everybody," said Dr. Patrick McSweeney, the president of the Milford Regional Physician Group. Dr. David Smith, the associate vice president of virtual medicine at UMass Memorial, was more confident. A UMass Memorial patient survey found 42% to have done a virtual visit, he said. Two-thirds would do it again. "Telehealth is here to stay," Smith said. "COVID was the shot in the arm it needed." Technological and trust hurdles The technology has long been in place to have doctors and patients meet electronically when making it to an office would be difficult or a certain specialist was far away. Doctors and other providers have been used to meeting with patients one day – face-to-face – their whole Dr. Larry Garber, an internist and the medical director for informatics at Reliant Medical Group, talks with a patient through telehealth technology. Melissa Buchner-Mehling (left) and Dr. Basava Vallabhaneni, who help oversee telehealth at Saint Vincent Hospital in Worcester. PHOTO/MATT WRIGHT

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