How To Prescribe A Better Patient Experience

As many of us have discovered during quarantine, we can get just about anything delivered to our doorsteps.

Anything except health care, that is. At first, the pandemic forced providers to finally meet us in our homes, via telemedicine. But there are signs that virtual care is on the decline. Telemedicine accounted for just 20% of patient visits in mid-July, compared to 70% in April.

Unwinding the progress we've made over the last seven months would be a great disservice to patients. But they don't need to return to the pre-pandemic status quo, with hospitals and doctor's offices as the primary locations for receiving care. Telemedicine, combined with innovative in-home diagnostic tools, really can eliminate the need for the majority of in-person doctor's visits.

Nearly 75% of doctor's visits are related to medication, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Many of these visits are perfunctory, made just so the doctor can say she saw the patient before dispensing a refill.

Take the hypothetical case of a middle-aged man with high blood pressure. He has to visit his physician twice a year to get a prescription for the medicine he needs all the time.

First, he has to call his doctor's office for an appointment. He'll probably have to take time off work and fill out a stack of forms upon arrival. He'll sit idly in a waiting room until the doctor is ready -- almost certainly well after his appointed time.

Then he'll spend less than 15 minutes with his doctor. Add on the trip to the pharmacy, plus the wait for his prescription, and our hypothetical patient has devoted two hours to something routine that should take five minutes.

Nothing about this experience is patient-centered. It's inconvenient, unpleasant, inefficient and needlessly expensive. It persisted in part because of regulatory hurdles, low insurer reimbursement rates, and a lack of interoperability between the various actors in the healthcare system.

The pandemic-fueled deployment of telemedicine gave patients a glimpse of what care focused on their needs can be like.

Consider how telemedicine can make a difference for our patient. Instead of devoting hours to an in-person visit, he communicates with his doctor from the comfort of his home. He doesn't call an office and wait on hold; he logs onto a secure portal to schedule his remote visit. He might confirm his insurance information or update his medical history. The consultation itself would be quick and painless. His doctor could then have his prescription delivered to his doorstep or a designated pick-up location.

Beyond this added convenience, virtual care would almost certainly save our patient money. Telehealth appointments are roughly half the cost of an in-person office visit. Patients can save as much as $121 per visit by utilizing telehealth services.

Prescription-oriented visits aren't the only appointments telemedicine could revolutionize. In-home diagnostics and remote monitoring could make annual check-ups virtual, too. Why not mail patients Bluetooth-enabled blood pressure cuffs and glucometers to allow doctors to check vital signs from afar? Wearable devices like the FitBit or Apple Watch can complement remote care by beaming physicians real-time data about patients' sleep patterns, activity level, and overall fitness.

For patients who are skittish about going to the doctor and avoid preventative care, this type of virtual experience could make all the difference for their overall health.

Of course, digital forms of care and in-person treatment aren't mutually exclusive. They can, and should, work in tandem in order to create the best and most exhaustive patient experience possible.

A hybrid model could also open doors for patients with limited access to specialized medical care.

Imagine a primary care physician working at a rural health clinic. She suspects an elderly patient has a heart condition -- but needs a specialist to confirm her initial diagnosis. Rural areas are notoriously short on specialists, which puts the patient and the primary care physician in a precarious position. However, telemedicine can bring a cardiologist thousands of miles away into the rural clinic -- giving that patient a level of care that was previously unimaginable.

Because of the pandemic, the house call is officially making a comeback. Except this time, the doctor is on a screen. Telemedicine, and the technology that enables it, are putting patients back at the center of the healthcare system. Even after COVID-19 abates, this focus on patient experience shouldn't.

Sid Viswanathan is co-founder and president of Truepill (www.truepill.com).