Page 30 - Part 2 Introduction to Telemedicine

SVMIC Introduction to Telemedicine

Parity Laws for Commercial Insurers

According to a November 2016 NBC Nightly News report , over 30
11
states had adopted some form of telemedicine payment parity law.
These require commercial insurers to cover certain telemedicine

visits that are comparable to the level of service as an office visit.

Conclusion

Healthcare is communication. Telemedicine, or telehealth, is just a

logical extension of the electronic network that has become

pervasive throughout the world. In its early days, the idea of a “TV
doctor” was a novelty, and regulators and payers struggled to

differentiate television medicine from the “regular” kind and build

standards for it. This narrow view utterly failed to anticipate the

explosion of applications that have erupted from a pool of creative

developers and the speed of their adoption.

Law always lags technology. Once again, we are dealing with

regulatory mechanisms and rules meticulously negotiated to solve

problems that society has already progressed beyond. Luckily,

healthcare is notoriously slow at incorporating new inventions into
its routines. As we think collectively about the implications of

merging e-communication into the medical workflow, we will need

to adapt technical, legal and administrative processes to deal with

the benefits and hazards this will bring. We probably have roughly

one generation before it’s an entirely new game.

11. NBC Nightly News, Growing U.S. Telemedicine Market Raises Questions About Cost (Nov. 24, 2016),
https://www.nbcnews.com/nightly-news/video/growing-u-s-telemedicine-market-raises-questions-about-cost-
817215043553.

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