Introduction
Telehealth is one of the most heavily discussed topics in healthcare. This term is used to describe a wide variety of services linked with digital communication between patients and healthcare professionals to facilitate long-range treatment. Nowadays, this type of service is utilized by approximately 60% of healthcare facilities in the United States (Tuckson et al., 2017). It is only natural for technology with such a wide range of implementation in healthcare to have an impact on auxiliary industries. Therefore, professions such as IT, especially IoT, specialists, and education, as new specialists must be prepared to utilize it to its full potential. This essay will briefly overview telemedicine, assess its impact on the healthcare system, and how it has shaped new advancements in medicine, education, and IT spheres.
Overview of Telehealth
Telehealth has been at the front of healthcare advancements for years since the beginning of the twenty-first century. With the ever-increasing complexity of the healthcare system, giving patients access to these services through the most convenient means becomes more relevant. Having no time or opportunity to reach healthcare facilities in person, patients nowadays can use such tools as videoconferences, live chats, and even virtual reality to seek medical advice. Moreover, Direct-to-consumer healthcare through telemedicine is just as helpful as a regular visit to a doctor (Halpren-Ruder et al., 2019). It is also easier for specialists to overview cases through telemedicine, making treatment more personalized and prescriptions more accurate (Taylor et al., 2018). Nonetheless, its development has only now made a major leap forward.
One of the most prominent events of the year 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic, brought to light the necessity to establish virtual contact with many essential services that are otherwise commonly accessed by personal visits. This sudden mass shift to the digital environment has created an influx of new patients seeking telehealth services, which is reflected in the spike in telehealth-related studies (Doraiswamy et al., 2020). Although these services were being actively developed prior to the pandemic, the increase in popularity ushered healthcare facilities, professionals, and policymakers to begin the rapid assimilation of telehealth into regular use (Doraiswamy et al., 2020). This event made telehealth trend beyond any expectations, bringing breakthroughs in its potential for utilization.
Telehealth is also aligned with other trends in healthcare, such as electronic health records (EHR). It allows professionals to seamlessly incorporate EHR into their workflow and focus on patients instead of recording their data throughout clinical routines (Tuckson et al., 2017). Although there are significant concerns over digitally stored personal data stemming from it being open to hacker attacks, it has many benefits over paper-based records (Watzlaf et al., 2017). Not only does it provide any professional involved in patient care with the utmost recent records, but it also gives them the ability to utilize the software for analysis of prescriptions or medical history (Watzlaf et al., 2017). It is apparent that telehealth is a vital part of the progress of healthcare in general.
The Impact of Telehealth on the Population
First, when considering telehealth usage, it is vital for facilities to analyze their local population. Socioeconomic factors play a major role in the viability of this method, which may prevent the majority of potential patients from accessing the services. It is known that telehealth often remains out of reach for low-income communities (Doraiswamy et al., 2020). Costs for accessing telehealth may be insurmountable for low-income households, especially when the local infrastructure is poorly set up, such as in rural areas (Triana et al., 2020). Therefore, achieving equal opportunities in reaching healthcare services via remote access is impossible, putting some populations that need such an opportunity the most at a disadvantage.
Moreover, the second issue lies in another socioeconomic factor that is only partially linked with one’s income status, as it also considers one’s age. Digital literacy, which is often widespread among younger generations, may appear to be insufficient among older populations who are not familiar with smartphone applications or video call software, such as Zoom or Skype (Triana et al., 2020). At the same time, rural populations, one of the primary target audiences for telehealth, have a shortage of accessible physicians (Chike-Harris et al., 2021). To eliminate this factor, the government is required to build an entirely new infrastructure that may not be easily doable within a short period.
The third reason for telehealth to be considered less than ideal for underresourced populations is its rare inclusion in insurance policies. For example, Medicare does not yet cover telehealth services adequately, as its formulation requires one to access healthcare in the originating site (Tuckson et al., 2017). Liability coverage is listed as the primary reason behind the reluctance of insurance companies to accept telehealth into the list of covered services (Tuckson et al., 2017). This makes both teaching healthcare personnel to utilize telehealth and getting patients to use this type of service highly problematic.
The Impact of Telehealth on Auxiliary Professions
Telehealth is also closely linked with a multitude of other fields of study. Aside from the aforementioned issues, there are several critical adverse aspects of telehealth that came to light with the rise of its popularity. There are legal issues that prevent telehealth from reaching its full potential that stem from its relative novelty and the lack of proper attention prior to the virus outbreak. The lack of specialists in IT and education industries who know the proper usage of telehealth may cause severe slowdowns in the development of this type of service.
Education serves as the basis for the spread of new advancements in healthcare. However, incorporating new knowledge into this process may take a significant amount of time before it becomes normalized through curriculums across the United States. Both healthcare professionals and their patients experience issues when utilizing telehealth, primarily due to the lack of knowledge on how to use communication devices efficiently (Triana et al., 2020). Patients need to be educated on how to access telehealth through such means as free courses, brochures, or online guides.
Telemedicine is not only a topic to be taught to students of medical education facilities but also a tool through which this education can be easily facilitated. The primary reason for telehealth usage is the provision of clinical care, although medical education remains in the top three (Doraiswamy et al., 2020). With the mass lockdowns and transfers of students to online courses, telehealth can serve as a replacement for practice, changing the direction of modern educational practices entirely. Courses on how to deliver medical information through telehealth should be considered essential for students, as such knowledge dramatically increases the frequency and efficiency of digital communication between professionals and patients (Serwe & Bowman, 2018). For example, experiential studies on the implementation of telehealth are being actively used as a means to progress educational methods for students who will adopt this technology in the nearest future (Serwe & Bowman, 2018). This process depends on the ability of educational facilities to transfer experience to the majority of both new and existing medical personnel.
Telehealth has also made an impact on IT technologies revolving around healthcare. It has caused numerous new regulations, such as HITECH, to be developed in order to protect patients’ private data (Watzlaf et al., 2017). There are necessary restrictions on the IT technologies involved in healthcare linked with potential security threats that can be detrimental for medical organizations and their patients. New methods of data encryption and transfer are being implemented in accordance with HIPAA, as IT specialists who assist healthcare facilities are adapting to the ever-evolving race against threats from hackers (Watzlaf et al., 2017). Not only do IT teams assist with internal networks, but they also help with connecting remote patients to their doctors.
Conclusion
In conclusion, telemedicine is a revolutionary method of healthcare service delivery that has caused many changes in the standard practices, as well as education professions related to healthcare and IT specialists’ tasks in this setting. Telemedicine became a top priority among developing technologies aiming to alleviate the impact of the pandemic and its necessary self-isolation. It allows patients who are otherwise unable to reach healthcare to resolve their concerns via digital means.
Nonetheless, there are challenges yet to resolve for telehealth to become genuinely effective in assisting all patients in need of healthcare. Telehealth requires a specific set of devices that may be inaccessible for low-income populations or too complex for older generations. With the rising need to provide essential remote services, these obstacles must be resolved as soon as possible for the healthcare system to move forward with the progress it has achieved. Alongside healthcare, there are two distinct fields of study: education and IT technology, that follow trends in telehealth and adopt new practices into their main knowledge bases.
References
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