The subject of telehealth reimbursement continues to vex the community. For example, Medicare lags far behind. According to the Center for Telehealth and eHealth Law, Medicare reimbursed approximately $14 million total under its telehealth benefit for 2014.
Category Archives: TeleHealth
Telehealth is the use of electronic information and telecommunications technologies to support long-distance clinical health care, patient and professional health-related education, public health and health administration
American Medical Association Supports Telemedicine Bill
The American Medical Association (AMA) today supported the bipartisan Creating Opportunities Now for Necessary and Effective Care Technologies (CONNECT) for Health Act to expand the use of telemedicine to achieve quality care for patients.
New Bill Could Expand Home Health Telemedicine
A bipartisan bill that would expand telemedicine services and remote patient monitoring (RPM) through Medicare is making headway in Congress with a projected cost savings of $1.8 billion over the next decade. The legislation could also help cut down the 7.88 billion miles home care workers traveled in 2013 for patient visits.
In past year, telemedicine reimbursement has gotten better, licensure worse
The American Telemedicine Association (ATA) has released the latest edition of its telemedicine state-by-state score card reports. There’s good news and bad news. In the area of coverage and reimbursement, 11 states and the District of Columbia saw their grades improve since September 2014, when ATA released the first editions of these reports, and only two saw their grades decline. But in the area of physician practice standards and licensure, 11 states saw their grades lowered while just six improved. Nevada was the only state to improve in both categories.
Telehealth Takes the Lead in Addiction Treatment
Anticipating that payers will soon embrace value-based addiction treatment programs, a national network of health providers is doubling down on mHealth.
Feds Urged to Make Telehealth a Standard of Care
In letters to the Senate Finance Committee and the AHRQ, organizations like the AHA and HIMSS are asking that current guidelines be amended to make telehealth easier to implement.
Only 15% of FPs Report Using Telehealth; Training and Lack of Reimbursement Are Top Barriers
In a 2014 national survey, only 15% of responding family physicians (FPs) reported using telehealth in the previous year, even though most agreed that telehealth could improve access to and continuity of care for their patients. More than one-half of FPs identified lack of training and reimbursement as key barriers to adoption of telehealth, with more than 40% noting the cost of technology and liability issues as additional barriers.
State, Local Governments Look to Telemedicine for Inmate Health
iHealthBeat, Monday, January 25, 2016
Prisons increasingly are embracing telemedicine tools to manage their inmates’ health care needs, Stateline/Government Technology reports.
According to Stateline/Government Technology, telemedicine provides a number of benefits to prison health care systems, particularly those in rural areas that have to transport potentially dangerous prisoners and their security escorts to hospitals for care. The ability to provide care remotely also attracts more doctors, including specialists, to participate in prison health care because it eliminates travel time and concerns of personal safety.
Although it can be difficult to estimate the cost savings from prison telemedicine programs, Owen Murray — vice president of correctional managed care for the University of Texas Medical Branch, which handles health care for about 80% of Texas’ prison inmates — attributed the state’s low per-capita spending on prisoner health care to the technology. A Pew Charitable Trusts report estimated that Texas spent about $3,805 per prisoner on health care in 2011, compared with the national average of $6,047.
State Statistics
Several states across the U.S. have adopted or expanded their prison telemedicine programs in recent years, in part because of the improvements in electronic health records and other health IT tools.
For example:
- Colorado Department of Corrections uses telemedicine in nine of its prisons to make care more accessible to inmates;
- Louisiana Department of Corrections uses telemedicine at nine state facilities and 14 local jails to conduct about 3,500 telemedicine appointments annually;
- In Texas, University of Texas Medical Branch conducts about 127,000 telemedicine appointments annually at the state’s 83 correctional facilities; and
- Wyoming uses telemedicine at five state prisons, conducting about 440 telemedicine appointments annually.
Comments
Bradley Brockman, director of the Center for Prisoner Health and Human Rights, called telemedicine “a godsend and a real gift because prisoners are getting care from providers or specialists that they would have far less chance of getting otherwise.”
However, David Fathi, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Prison Project, raised concerns about the technology being used inappropriately or excessively to save on health care costs. He cited a lawsuit in Arizona where full medical histories were not provided to doctors practicing telemedicine in prison. Fathi said, “Telemedicine does offer some positives, but it is never going to be as good as having an on-site physician who can perform hands-on diagnosis and treatment” (Ollove, Stateline/Government Technology, 1/21).
Source: iHealthBeat, Monday, January 25, 2016
Telehealth network’s Southeastern expansion means more jobs, services
The University of Mississippi Medical Center’s Center for Telehealth and Intel-GE Care Innovations has had such success providing the Diabetes Health Telehealth Network that it is being expanded to serve those with other chronic diseases and those underserved across the Southeast.
3 states earn failing grade when it comes to telemedicine
The American Telemedicine Association awarded 22 states an “A” for regulations governing telemedicine providers-patient encounters, Vermeulen reported. However, three states — Texas, Alabama and Arkansas — got an F.