Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina will grant $750,000 to Charlotte, N.C.-based Atrium Health to increase its virtual clinic access for local elementary schools.
Three notes:
1. The grant will extend over three years to expand Atrium Health Levine Children's hospital's school-based virtual clinic to additional schools in Cleveland County.
2. The clinic was launched in 2017 to improve access to pediatricians while children are at school. Using audio and video technology, students are evaluated by a pediatrician located remotely at Levine Children's Shelby Children's Clinic, and parents are invited to join in-person or via audio or video.
"The virtual clinic provides families the opportunity to seek medical care for their school-aged children more readily," Patricia Grinton, MD, director of Levine Children's Shelby Children’s Virtual Clinic, said in a news release emailed to Becker's Hospital Review. "The students are evaluated for healthcare needs while they remain at school and their parents continue their daily activities, such as work."
3. Since rolling out the telemedicine program, the virtual clinic has reduced unnecessary emergency department visits by 55.6 percent for those students seen via virtual appointment.