Telemedicine continues to move from the peripheries of healthcare into the mainstream. Earlier this week, a national review of 145 telemedicine studies conducted by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Qualityconcluded that the technology likely improves access to care and has clinical benefits in acute and chronic care. This report also found less robust evidence that telemedicine in these settings likely reduces ICU length of stay, mortality, and costs.
As telemedicine becomes more recognized, its role in healthcare is growing. Uses of the technology are going beyond the four walls of a hospital, delivery is becoming less reliant on payer-based models, and government bodies and policymakers are increasingly stepping up to bat when it comes to telemedicine-friendly regulation and government-funded programs.
Here is a closer look at a few of the leading telemedicine trends that have emerged so far in 2018.