Telehealth adoption within the inpatient healthcare space is on the rise, with 85 percent of providers currently using telehealth services at their organizations, according to a recent Definitive Healthcare report.
Definitive Healthcare, a company that provides data and intelligence on the healthcare provider market, surveyed 175 healthcare providers in C-Suite and information technology leadership positions for its 2019 Inpatient Telehealth Study. The survey participants belong to academic medical centers, critical access hospitals, and urban and rural hospitals and health systems.
Six report insights:
1. Eighty-five percent of respondents said their organization currently uses a telehealth solution or service, up 31 percent from 54 percent of survey participants in 2014.
2. Two-way video/webcam has seen the highest technology adoption rate among participants, with 70 percent of organizations using physician-to-patient video via computer desktop or mobile device this year.
3. In 2017, only 60 percent of survey respondents said they used two-way video/webcam for physician-to-patient encounters. One year prior, just 48 percent of participants said they used the technology.
4. While remote patient monitoring via consumer devices continues to grow in the inpatient telehealth space, the method was used by just 11.3 percent of survey respondents this year.
5. Ninety percent of survey participants said they have future investment plans in telehealth scheduled within the next 12 months to 18 months.
6. The driving factor that prohibited organizations from implementing telehealth or investing services is budget, according to 37.5 percent of survey respondents.