Worcester Business Journal

14 Worcester Business Journal | April 18, 2022 | wbjournal.com F O C U S H E A L T H C A R E BY SLOANE M. PERRON WBJ Staff Writer D rones dropping de- fibrillators from the sky, wearable watches that improve CPR, and tele- health services bringing medical expertise to any location in the world are just a few innovations seeking to improve medical outcomes in hard-to- reach areas. e COVID-19 pandemic had many negatives that irrevocably changed soci- ety; however, the crisis highlighted gaps in the healthcare industry now being addressed. One of these notable gaps was the lack of accessibility to healthcare services in rural areas. Lack of transpor- tation combined with long proximity away from medical centers are some of the major hurdles residents in small towns must overcome to receive medical treatment. Massachusetts has a landmass of Addressing rural health New technologies are being developed to help those populations further removed from key healthcare facilities 7,800 square miles with most of its 7,029,917 population situated in cities and urban areas along the East Coast. Meanwhile, 105,884 people live in rural areas throughout Central and Western Massachusetts, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Technologies such as telehealth quickly adopted in the crisis situation of lockdowns have become healthcare models that are here to stay. "Telehealth is a really nice perk that I think before the pandemic, we were not utilizing, literally very much at all, and now we are. So, that might be the silver lining in all of this is that we figured out how to meet patients kind of where they are in terms of being able to do some telemedicine with them if they can't come into the office in a physical way," said Dr. Elizabeth Siraco, medical direc- tor of Milford Regional Physician Group. Obstacles in rural healthcare Dr. Kate McIntosh is the vice president and chief medical officer of Springfield-based insurer Health New England, which provides services in Worcester. Prior to joining Health New England in October, McIntosh had an 18-year medical career in Vermont and served as the only pediatrician in Benzie County, a rural area of Michigan from 1998 to 2004. "Travel becomes an issue to get to healthcare services. In rural health care, there are fewer providers, and sometimes there are fewer hospitals; or the hospital that they have they have to go farther for to receive services like specialty care," McIntosh said. Milford Regional Medical Center services an area that includes some outlying communities far from key healthcare facilities. ILLUSTRATION | ADOBESTOCK.COM PHOTO | GRANT WELKER

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