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If one were to list professions that require intensive care and attention to detail, medicine would be at the top. Since medical errors can be a literal matter of life and death, the emphasis on detail and careful analysis in the field makes sense. But if doctors and healthcare professionals are already struggling with increasing stress under normal circumstances, coping with a major pandemic has certainly not helped.
More than 60% of emergency departments and 53% of intensive care physicians reported feeling occupational burnout in 2021, and many fields rank similarly in numbers. This stress has already pushed many out of medicine, as more than 1.7 million In the first half of 2022 alone, U.S. health workers have quit their jobs.
Related: Why Telemedicine Is The Future Of Healthcare
Walking the tightrope of health care
With 47% of healthcare professionals planning to: leave the field By 2025, how can physicians and specialists bear the additional burden to maintain consistent levels of care while reducing the additional stress? Technological advancements in healthcare can help those who bear the brunt of patients’ needs to maintain their sanity and business without compromising.
Before your mind wanders to robotic doctors, the reality is that most of the truly impactful technological advances in healthcare are rather mundane. Naturally, groundbreaking progress in treatment are consistently created, but the day-to-day operations are where Medtech development thrives. One such development that addresses the pain points of everyday GPs and specialists is remote care and virtual patient monitoring.
With an influx of patients due to a global pandemic and dormant diseases resurfaceis it no surprise that doctors and medical systems are reaching intensive care capacities faster than normal. While such an influx would likely indicate an increase in cases, reaching capacity levels could hinder revenue and billable hours for specialists dealing with complex illnesses as they have to become more selective in seeing which patients to serve. to see.
Reinventing care models
Remote treatment offers the greatest opportunity to reinvent healthcare business models to the benefit of patients, physicians and medical systems. So much so that Amazon noticed it despite shut down are emergency and primary care, and buy One Medical instead. But Amazon’s big hole in developing primary care could allow other companies and developers to step in.
Currently, the gaps in telemedicine care mean that patients in acute medical situations: rely on hypochondriac-friendly, panic-inducing websites like WebMD to self-diagnose. But avoiding a doctor’s visit in favor of a Google search or an over-the-counter pill means that patients may not receive the proper care they need.
“We see more traditional health organizations looking for ways to handle the influx of patients, not just hiring more doctors. Healthcare leaders have started looking for technology solutions that would help on a large scale.” , said Eitan Ron, co-founder and CEO of Kahun, a startup that has built an evidence-based clinical reasoning tool for physicians.
“One of the key elements in maximizing revenue through virtual care is providing GPs with all the information they need prior to a virtual session, which optimizes physician time, improves the overall quality of the visit and enables them to allows to see more patients.”
This type of development is especially valuable outside primary care, as the virtual collection of information can increase the capacity of GPs to help patients with nuanced or chronic diseases. Through pre-screening or ‘always-on’ patient monitoring tools, doctors can better understand which symptoms they can alleviate and which diseases they can help treat remotely.
For example, platforms like DreaMed Diabetes’s Endo Digital allow physicians to optimize patients’ insulin therapy remotely by using the company’s proprietary algorithm to review, adjust, and approve treatment without an appointment. In rural areas where specialists are scarce, this kind of remote technology is a win-win situation for patients who cannot find good personal care and for practitioners who can now provide patients with expert analysis and care capabilities.
Remote healthcare and telemedicine technologies come with a learning curve, and healthcare providers can be ambivalent about their effectiveness and impact on billable hours. But they are an incredible asset to any practitioner’s toolbox for balancing their business needs with the care needed to treat patients well. Telemedicine offers new opportunities for physicians to thrive in a crisis by maintaining or increasing their patient intake without increasing work stress, while improving healthcare for all.
Related: How Entrepreneurs Can Use Telemedicine After Covid-19
