Can Telehealth Really Cut U.S. Healthcare Costs?

The quantitative answer to this question has evaded medical professionals for dozens of years. There are many reasons, but two principal ones are the use of high-cost labour in some solutions, and secondly, a piecemeal approach which may not support a long-lasting business model.

A holistic view surfaces some basic truths which ‘we hold self-evident’. The volume transactions are in outpatient visits which can be more easily handled by telehealth. It is the largest healthcare cost segment, and the second highest increasing segment. Main contributors are doctor and ER visits.

So, if one could come up with a more comprehensive telehealth solution, hypothetically, to handle 30%-50% of such cases, the volume would result from addressing low-acuity cases and monitoring chronic illness. That means that a desired telehealth solution should be able to handle more patients and likely shift to on-demand. To get the costs down, the solution should also be able to utilize fewer doctors and better utilize nurse practitioners who can prescribe medicines for many conditions. As telehealth requires telecommunications links, the heart of the system must have flexibility, adequate performance, and low cost to facilitate natural interaction of the participants and meet the requirements of medical practice. Lastly,…