In this article, written by Oleg Bestsennyy, Greg Gilbert, Alex Harris, and Jennifer Rost, they discussed the rise of telehealth and the reasons behind that growth.
This step-change, borne out of necessity, was enabled by these factors: 1) increased consumer willingness to use telehealth, 2) increased provider willingness to use telehealth, 3) regulatory changes enabling greater access and reimbursement. During the tragedy of the pandemic, telehealth offered a bridge to care, and now offers a chance to reinvent virtual and hybrid virtual/in-person care models, with a goal of improved healthcare access, outcomes, and affordability. A year ago, we estimated that up to $250 billion of US healthcare spend could potentially be shifted to virtual or virtually enabled care. Approaching this potential level of virtual health is not a foregone conclusion. It would likely require sustained consumer and clinician adoption and accelerated redesign of care pathways to incorporate virtual modalities.
Since the initial spike in April 2020, telehealth adoption overall has approached up to 17 percent of all outpatient/office visit claims with evaluation and management (E&M) services. This utilization has been relatively stable since June 2020. We are also seeing a differential uptake of telehealth depending on specialty, with the highest penetration in psychiatry (50 percent) and substance use treatment (30 percent).
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