Telehealth

The Federal Communications Commission has approved 10 waves of COVID-19 telehealth program applications, funneling more than $104 million in funding to 305 healthcare providers across the U.S.

Optum continued to grow through the first quarter of 2020, even as the company turned its attention to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Chicago-based CommonSpirit Health expanded its Health at Home telehealth program, adding remote monitoring and medication management capabilities for COVID-19 and high-risk patients. 

St. Paul, Minn.-based Regions Hospital is testing a new ventilator developed by Medtronic that allows clinicians to monitor the devices without physically entering COVID-19 patient rooms, according to local NBC affiliate KARE. 

CMS is expanding its list of audio-only telephone services covered by Medicare as well as making several other updates to telehealth coverage.

HHS awarded $20 million to increase telehealth access and infrastructure in response to the COVID-19 pandemic for providers including the American Academy of Pediatrics, University of North Carolina Maternal Health Care.

Teladoc Health reported 2 million total virtual visits during the first quarter of 2020, up 92 percent from last year.

The COVID-19 pandemic has driven rapid expansion of telemedicine use for both urgent care and non-urgent care visits, growing 683 percent and 4,345 percent, respectively, at NYU Langone Health, according to a recent Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association…

Both Democratic and Republican legislators want to further expansion of telehealth services, especially for Medicare beneficiaries, according to a report in The Hill, which held a virtual event on April 29 that included industry leaders and lawmakers.

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, health systems are using clinical communication, telehealth, patient engagement, and provider scheduling platforms to mitigate capacity and staffing challenges while delivering quality patient care.