Telemedicine is becoming commonplace in the hospital. It's a great way for physicians to engage with hard-to-reach patients and for patients to get timely second opinions. It can save lives. Still, telemedicine and virtual access to physicians aren't always leveraged to their full potentials.
This is something that Palo Alto, Calif.-based virtual care app HealthTap has set out to change.
The company seeks to democratize access to health information and physicians. Currently, HealthTap's users include 64,000 U.S. physicians in good standing as well as a millions of patients.
HealthTap offers three services. One service, HealthTap, provides patients with free, peer-reviewed physician answers to medical questions submitted by patients, physician-generated health tips, physician-curated health news and physician reviews of health apps.
The second service, HealthTap Prime, is a paid subscription service providing patients with around-the-clock access to virtual consults with primary care physicians.
The third service, HealthTap Concierge, is the company's latest offering. It has been built with the intention of helping patients improve engagement and follow through on physician recommendations or orders between visits. The HealthTap Concierge platform enables patient and physician users connect for virtual consults via text, video or audio through computer or mobile device. Every consult ends with a doctor created "checklist" for the patient, complete with automated reminders based on a frequency set up by the physician.
"More than 50 percent of medications that are prescribed are never taken. So, we're adopting a checklist that we have physicians create and prescribe alongside any recommended treatment [like medication]. It's three to six simple, actionable items to help people remember what they need to do," says HealthTap CEO Ron Gutman of the capability.
As a result of offering these checklists, HealthTap hopes to create better follow-through from virtual consults. Patients benefit from having a better framework to heed physician instructions, and physicians can rest easier knowing patients will do a better job caring for themselves.
Still, while the app is an important complement to care, Mr. Gutman says it's not intended to replace it. "It will augment and create a paradigm that will complement what physicians are doing in the real world," he says.
The real world may soon include a more permanent virtual concierge component, however, and HealthTap affords physicians the opportunity to create a free, self-serve virtual practice, a practice that Mr. Gutman suspects will become commonplace in the next five years.
"We really want to change the world and make a difference," he adds. "We're mission-driven, and it's important for us as a company to emphasize that we are here to do good and change the world for the better. Healthcare is a human right."