Dr. Rajesh Geria on the Evolving Role of Telehealth in Urgent Care
A critical aspect of access to healthcare includes wait times. With an increasing demand for urgent medical services, telehealth has been at the forefront of medicine, helping to reform the current standard of care. Dr. Rajesh Geria postulates that areas where it can be difficult to access healthcare would also be greatly aided through the use of telehealth.
Past Trends
Dr. Rajesh Geria notes that the average time spent in an emergency room in the U.S. is approximately two hours, depending on the time of year or day, and staff availability. For individuals and families living in rural areas, time travel to and from the ER is also a significant factor. With the recent increase in care clinics, patients have access to care without the extended ER visit. Telehealth continues to help bridge these gaps in the healthcare system.
What is Telehealth?
In New Jersey law, telehealth is defined as “the use of information and communications technologies, including telephones, remote patient monitoring devices, or other electronic means, to support clinical health care, provider consultation, provide health-related education, health administration, and other services”. With telehealth, doctors and patients can connect and conduct an appointment remotely through the use of telecommunication technology. There are four prominent areas of telehealth: asynchronous, synchronous, remote patient monitoring (RPM), and mobile health (mHealth).
Role in Urgent Care
With urgent care centers, synchronous telehealth allows for live interaction between the healthcare provider and the patient. Interaction is achieved through live video calling, where the patient can speak directly with the provider as they would at a standard appointment. Through technological advancements, an urgent care visit can seem very much like a regular visit with a physician. Stethoscopes that can transmit heart and lung sounds in real time have been engineered to allow doctors to take a listen as if they were physically present, and this can be done in the urgent care center by trained staff or medical assistants.
Dr. Rajesh Geria claims that video calling also allows for healthcare providers to assess various ailments such as rashes, watch and listen to a patient cough, and examine ears, throat, and eyes. These tools are extremely beneficial as doctors can “see” patients from any location any time of day. Utilizing digital technology allows for a larger pool of doctors available to patients, which significantly decreases wait times and minimizes staff shortages.
Ultimately, through telecommunications, more individuals will have access to healthcare in a timelier manner, allowing for a quicker diagnosis, which in some cases can improve health outcomes. Telehealth is a productive solution for individuals who suffer from chronic diseases or the elderly who are often unable to travel a significant distance and require in-home guidance.
Telehealth also offers to help in rural areas where doctors may not always be easily accessible. Need for patient travel decreases and patients may be more willing to go into an urgent care center if there was one nearby.
With population growth that is disproportionate to the number of new doctors and trained medical professionals, strain on the current healthcare system is at its highest. With telehealth, this strain can be reduced greatly by allowing for a new type of doctor’s visit.
