A missed pediatric follow-up is rarely just a scheduling problem. For many families, it reflects transportation barriers, time away from work, long travel distances, sensory stress for the child, or limited local access to pediatric specialists. That is why community-based pediatric healthcare solutions are becoming a strategic priority for healthcare organizations that want to improve access without lowering clinical standards.

For hospitals, pediatric practices, federally qualified health centers, rural clinics, school-based programs, and community health centers, the question is no longer whether care can extend beyond the exam room. The real question is how to do it in a way that is clinically useful, operationally realistic, and financially sustainable. When designed well, community-based models can support timely assessment, stronger caregiver engagement, and better continuity for children who need care in places that are more familiar and less disruptive.

Why community-based pediatric healthcare solutions matter now

Pediatric access challenges tend to compound. A child in a rural area may face a shortage of specialists. A child with autism or other special healthcare needs may struggle with the sensory demands of a busy clinic. A working parent may postpone preventive or follow-up care because the logistics are too hard to manage. These issues affect outcomes, but they also affect workflow, patient retention, and care quality metrics.

Community-based pediatric healthcare solutions respond to those gaps by moving more of the care pathway closer to where children already are – at home, in schools, in local clinics, and in trusted community settings. That does not mean every pediatric encounter should be virtual or decentralized. It means health systems can be more selective and more efficient about which services require in-person visits and which can be safely supported through clinician-directed virtual exams, remote patient monitoring, and coordinated follow-up.

This distinction matters. Community-based care is not a replacement for traditional pediatrics. It is an extension of pediatric capacity.

What effective community-based pediatric care actually looks like

The strongest programs are not built around video alone. Basic video visits have value, but pediatric care often requires more context and better data. Providers need the ability to assess symptoms, monitor trends, engage caregivers, and determine when escalation is needed.

That is where connected-care infrastructure becomes essential. A more mature model may include virtual physical exam tools, remote patient monitoring, secure care coordination, and workflows tailored to the child’s condition, age, and care setting. In practical terms, that can support everything from respiratory symptom evaluation and chronic condition follow-up to post-discharge monitoring and school-connected care coordination.

For pediatric organizations, the clinical environment also matters. Many children are more cooperative in familiar settings. That can be especially meaningful for autistic children and pediatric patients with special healthcare needs. When assessment and monitoring can happen in lower-stress environments, clinicians often gain a more representative view of the child’s baseline function, while caregivers can participate more actively in the encounter.

The operational advantage for provider organizations

Healthcare leaders evaluating community-based pediatric healthcare solutions are usually balancing three pressures at once: access, workforce constraints, and reimbursement. Any model that adds burden without improving throughput or continuity is difficult to scale.

A strong community-based approach can help reduce non-urgent in-person utilization, support earlier intervention, and give pediatric teams more flexibility in how they manage follow-up. It may also help organizations extend limited specialist capacity into community settings without requiring every patient to travel to a central site.

That said, implementation is where many programs succeed or fail. Technology alone does not create a usable care model. Organizations need workflows that define who initiates the encounter, what data is collected, how documentation is handled, how caregivers are engaged, and when in-person escalation is triggered. They also need training, operational ownership, and a reimbursement-aware deployment plan.

These details are not secondary. They determine whether a virtual pediatric program remains a pilot or becomes part of routine care delivery.

Community-based pediatric healthcare solutions in real care settings

The best use cases are often the ones that solve a concrete bottleneck.

In a rural health clinic, community-based pediatric healthcare solutions may allow local staff to support a clinician-directed virtual exam while collaborating with a distant pediatric provider. In a school-based setting, they may help evaluate common symptoms earlier, reduce unnecessary dismissals, and keep caregivers connected to the care process. In a pediatric practice, they may improve chronic care management and follow-up for patients who otherwise miss appointments due to travel or scheduling barriers.

Post-discharge care is another high-value area. Pediatric readmissions and avoidable emergency utilization are not always driven by clinical deterioration alone. Families may be uncertain about what is normal, when to call, or how to manage symptoms at home. Remote monitoring and structured follow-up can close that gap, giving providers better visibility between visits and helping caregivers act sooner.

There are also situations where the community setting itself improves the quality of the encounter. Children who become dysregulated in clinical environments may engage more effectively from home or another familiar location. For organizations serving neurodiverse populations, that is not just a convenience issue. It can directly affect the quality and completeness of assessment.

The technology requirements are higher than many teams expect

Healthcare organizations often underestimate how much pediatric virtual care depends on clinically relevant data. If a program relies only on conversation and observation, it may work for simple triage but fall short for broader care delivery goals.

Effective community-based pediatric healthcare solutions should support clinician-directed assessment, not just communication. That includes tools that help providers capture relevant findings remotely, support care team coordination, and integrate with existing operational processes. Just as important, the platform should fit the reality of distributed care environments, where staff skill levels, connectivity, and patient support needs can vary significantly.

Security, HIPAA compliance, and documentation workflows are part of the baseline. Beyond that, healthcare leaders should evaluate whether the technology can adapt to different pediatric use cases, support remote patient monitoring, and align with reimbursement pathways such as RPM, CCM, or other virtual care services when appropriate. Not every encounter will qualify, and payer variation still matters, but reimbursement-aware planning is essential if the model is expected to last.

Why caregiver participation is central, not optional

Pediatric care is rarely a one-to-one interaction between clinician and patient. It depends on a caregiver network that notices symptoms, manages medications, supports daily routines, and makes decisions about follow-up. Community-based care models work best when they strengthen that network instead of treating it as an afterthought.

When caregivers can join an encounter from home, school, or work, participation often improves. They can ask better questions, show clinicians what they are seeing in real time, and become more confident in the care plan. That has operational value too. Clearer communication can reduce avoidable callbacks, missed instructions, and fragmented follow-up.

This is one reason connected-care models are gaining traction. They make it easier to build a true circle of support around the child rather than forcing every interaction through a single clinic visit. For organizations building pediatric access strategies, that shift can be just as important as the technology itself.

What healthcare leaders should evaluate before launching

A successful program starts with a realistic view of where community-based pediatric care will create the most value. For some organizations, that is specialty reach into rural sites. For others, it is ongoing monitoring, school-connected care, or follow-up for children with complex needs.

From there, leaders should assess clinical appropriateness, staffing models, caregiver readiness, and billing pathways. They should also identify what level of virtual exam capability is necessary. A low-acuity triage model requires one kind of setup. A program intended to support more complete assessments and longitudinal management requires another.

This is where a connected-care partner can make a measurable difference. Platforms such as Dr. Miltie combine virtual exam capability, remote monitoring, workflow customization, and deployment support in ways that help organizations move beyond isolated telehealth visits toward a more scalable pediatric access model. The key is not adding more technology for its own sake. It is choosing infrastructure that supports clinical decision-making and fits the organization’s operating reality.

The future of pediatric care will not be defined by one location. It will be defined by how effectively providers bring clinically credible care into the places where children and families can actually receive it.

The post Community-Based Pediatric Healthcare Solutions appeared first on Dr. Miltie.

A missed follow-up visit is rarely just a scheduling problem. For a parent managing an autistic child’s care, a rural patient facing a two-hour drive, or a community clinic trying to stretch limited clinician capacity, that missed visit often reflects a larger access gap. That is exactly where how virtual examinations improve healthcare access becomes more than a telehealth talking point. It becomes an operational strategy for reaching patients who are often hardest to serve through traditional, site-based care alone.

Virtual care has moved well beyond video visits. For healthcare organizations under pressure to improve access, continuity, and outcomes, the real value comes from clinician-directed virtual examinations that allow providers to assess patients with greater clinical confidence outside the exam room. When supported by connected devices, care coordination workflows, and reimbursement-aware implementation, virtual examinations can help organizations extend care in ways that are practical, scalable, and better aligned with patient needs.

Why access problems are often exam problems

Many care gaps persist because the traditional in-person visit assumes patients can reliably travel, tolerate the setting, and return as often as clinically appropriate. That assumption breaks down quickly in pediatrics, rural health, safety-net care, and chronic disease management.

A video call alone may help with basic triage, medication review, or patient education. But when clinicians need to listen to lung sounds, examine the ears or throat, observe skin findings more closely, or gather additional physiologic data, standard telehealth can fall short. The result is often an unnecessary referral to urgent care, a delayed diagnosis, or a visit that must be repeated in person.

Virtual examination capabilities change that equation. By bringing more of the physical exam into the virtual encounter, healthcare organizations can reduce the distance between a patient’s location and a clinician’s decision-making capacity. That matters because access is not only about getting a patient onto a video platform. It is about enabling meaningful clinical evaluation without making every encounter depend on travel to a facility.

How virtual examinations improve healthcare access in practice

The strongest case for virtual examinations is operational, not theoretical. They improve healthcare access by removing barriers that prevent patients from completing care while preserving a higher standard of clinical assessment than video-only models typically allow.

For rural and underserved communities, the most immediate benefit is reduced travel burden. Patients who live far from specialty services, pediatric providers, or follow-up care often delay visits until symptoms worsen. Virtual examinations allow organizations to deliver timely assessments through distributed care models, including homes, schools, community clinics, and partner sites. That can be especially valuable for critical access hospitals, federally qualified health centers, and rural health clinics trying to expand clinical reach without overextending workforce resources.

For pediatric populations, access is often shaped by environment as much as geography. Some children, especially those with sensory sensitivities, autism, or special healthcare needs, may be more comfortable and more cooperative in familiar settings. A lower-stress encounter can produce better participation and more useful information for the clinician. It can also reduce the logistical strain on caregivers, who may otherwise need to coordinate transportation, school absences, time off work, and childcare for siblings.

Virtual examinations also improve healthcare access by making follow-up more achievable. Many organizations struggle not only with initial access, but with keeping patients engaged across the care continuum. Follow-up visits after an acute episode, chronic care management check-ins, medication monitoring, and post-discharge reassessments are all vulnerable to no-shows when in-person attendance is the default. A virtual exam model that includes clinically relevant patient data can make those touchpoints easier to complete without sacrificing quality.

The difference between telehealth access and clinical access

This distinction matters for healthcare leaders evaluating technology investments. Telehealth access means a patient can connect. Clinical access means a provider can assess, decide, and act with enough confidence to move care forward.

That difference becomes clear in use cases where visual observation is not enough. A child with an earache may need otoscopic imaging. A patient with respiratory symptoms may require more than a conversation about shortness of breath. A chronic care patient may need remote monitoring data to support treatment decisions between office visits.

When virtual examination tools are integrated into care delivery, clinicians can often gather a fuller picture during the encounter itself. That reduces the number of fragmented touchpoints where the patient is told to schedule another visit, go elsewhere for evaluation, or wait until symptoms change. In operational terms, it can improve throughput, reduce avoidable escalation, and support more appropriate utilization across the continuum.

Still, it depends on the clinical scenario. Not every condition can or should be managed virtually. Some patients require hands-on examination, imaging, procedures, or emergency care. The goal is not to replace in-person medicine. It is to reserve in-person resources for the encounters that truly require them while enabling more patients to receive timely clinician-directed evaluation where they are.

Why pediatric and community-based care see outsized benefits

Pediatric care is one of the clearest examples of how virtual examinations improve healthcare access because the barriers are often layered. Children depend on adults for transportation, scheduling, and communication. Families may face long drives, missed work, school disruptions, or behavioral stress tied to clinical environments. These factors can delay care even when a provider is technically available.

A virtual exam model allows care to move closer to the child. In homes, schools, pediatric practices, and community settings, clinicians can evaluate symptoms, involve caregivers directly, and support continuity without requiring every concern to become a facility-based visit. For children with complex needs, that can improve adherence to follow-up plans and create a more consistent connection between family, care team, and local support systems.

Community-based organizations also benefit because virtual examinations can strengthen the role of distributed care settings. A school nurse, community health worker, or clinic support team may help facilitate the encounter while the clinician conducts the evaluation remotely. That model can be particularly useful in areas where specialist access is limited or where workforce shortages make traditional scheduling difficult.

Administrative value matters too

Healthcare access initiatives often fail when they are clinically appealing but operationally fragile. Decision-makers need models that fit into compliance requirements, staffing realities, and reimbursement pathways.

Virtual examination programs work best when they are designed around workflow, training, and financial sustainability from the beginning. That includes selecting use cases where remote physical assessment adds clear value, defining who supports the encounter on the patient side, aligning documentation with payer expectations, and ensuring clinicians can incorporate device-enabled findings into routine decision-making.

This is also where connected-care platforms stand apart from standalone telehealth tools. Organizations need more than video. They need coordinated pathways that can support remote patient monitoring, chronic care management, follow-up workflows, and caregiver participation. They also need implementation models that recognize the realities of HIPAA compliance, CMS reimbursement, staff adoption, and multi-site deployment.

Dr. Miltie addresses this need through a connected-care approach that combines virtual examination capabilities, patient monitoring, workflow customization, and its Circle of Care model to help organizations expand access in a way that is clinically meaningful and operationally sustainable.

What healthcare leaders should evaluate before scaling

The most successful programs start with a focused question: which access barriers are we trying to solve? For some organizations, the answer is rural follow-up. For others, it is pediatric specialty reach, post-discharge continuity, school-based access, or chronic disease monitoring.

From there, leaders should look at whether virtual examinations will improve clinical decision-making enough to reduce unnecessary in-person visits, speed intervention, or strengthen continuity. They should also examine where caregiver involvement, community-based facilitation, or distributed workforce models could improve patient participation.

There are trade-offs. Not every population has equal digital readiness. Some settings need stronger onboarding, better connectivity, or on-site support. Clinicians may require training to adapt exam techniques and workflows for virtual encounters. And reimbursement opportunities vary by program design and payer mix. Those are not reasons to avoid virtual examinations. They are reasons to implement them deliberately.

Healthcare access improves when care models reflect how patients actually live, not just how clinics have historically operated. Virtual examinations make that shift possible by extending clinician-directed assessment into the places where barriers are lower and engagement is more realistic. For healthcare organizations focused on pediatrics, rural communities, and underserved populations, that is not just a technology upgrade. It is a more practical way to bring care closer to the people who need it most.

The post How Virtual Examinations Improve Healthcare Access appeared first on Dr. Miltie.

A pulse oximeter that gets used twice and left in a drawer is not a remote care strategy. For healthcare organizations building sustainable virtual programs, remote patient monitoring wearables need to do more than collect data. They need to fit clinical workflows, support reimbursement, reduce patient burden, and produce information a care team can actually act on.

That is where many RPM initiatives succeed or stall. The question is not whether wearables can generate more data. It is whether they can help clinicians extend care safely and efficiently into homes, schools, community settings, and rural environments where access gaps are real and follow-up is often harder than diagnosis.

What remote patient monitoring wearables need to solve

In practice, wearables sit at the intersection of patient engagement, chronic care management, clinical oversight, and operational design. A device may measure heart rate, oxygen saturation, blood pressure, temperature, activity, sleep, or glucose trends, but the value comes from what happens next. If readings are inconsistent, if transmission fails, or if staff cannot interpret data in context, the wearable becomes another disconnected technology layer.

For providers serving pediatric populations, rural communities, and medically underserved patients, the bar is even higher. Devices must be simple enough for caregivers to use correctly, dependable enough for distributed care models, and flexible enough to support clinician-directed follow-up. In many cases, comfort and familiarity matter just as much as technical capability. A child with sensory sensitivities or special healthcare needs may tolerate one form factor and reject another. That trade-off can determine adherence more than the spec sheet does.

Where remote patient monitoring wearables make the biggest impact

The strongest use cases tend to share one trait: they answer a specific clinical and operational need.

For chronic disease programs, wearables can help care teams identify deterioration earlier and intervene before a patient ends up in the emergency department. For post-discharge monitoring, they can support a safer transition home and reduce the risk of missed warning signs. For maternal and pediatric care, they can reduce travel demands on families who would otherwise need repeated in-person checks for relatively routine follow-up.

Rural health organizations often see another benefit. Remote monitoring can help stretch limited workforce capacity without lowering clinical oversight. When a specialist is far away, a connected care model can give local teams better visibility into patient status and help patients remain in their communities longer. That matters for access, but it also matters for equity. Travel time, missed work, childcare logistics, and transportation barriers are clinical barriers when they delay care.

In pediatrics, the value case is slightly different. Children are not simply smaller adults, and caregiver participation is central. Wearables that support remote observation in lower-stress environments can improve continuity for children who struggle with frequent clinic visits, including autistic children and those with special healthcare needs. The right model does not replace pediatric expertise. It helps bring that expertise closer to where the child is.

Why standalone wearables often underperform

A wearable on its own rarely fixes fragmented care. Many organizations learn this after purchasing devices before defining escalation protocols, staffing models, documentation pathways, or patient eligibility criteria.

The most common failure point is not hardware. It is workflow. If incoming data lands in a portal that no one checks consistently, alerts are too frequent to be useful, or readings cannot be tied to a virtual assessment, clinicians may not trust the program. Administrators may then see RPM as expensive monitoring rather than meaningful care delivery.

There is also a compliance and reimbursement layer. RPM programs need clear documentation standards, patient consent processes, device management protocols, and billing workflows aligned with applicable CMS and payer requirements. It depends on the care setting, patient population, and service mix, but organizations generally do better when RPM is implemented as part of a broader care model rather than a device rollout.

Choosing wearables for clinical relevance, not novelty

Healthcare leaders evaluating remote patient monitoring wearables should start with the clinical question, not the device catalog. What conditions are being monitored? Which metrics change care decisions? Who reviews the data? How quickly does the team need to respond? What level of patient or caregiver training is realistic?

For some programs, a simple connected device is enough. For others, wearable data needs to be paired with virtual physical assessment, symptom review, and care coordination. That distinction matters. A trend line can flag concern, but it may not explain the cause. Clinician-directed remote exams can add needed context when a number alone is not enough.

This is especially relevant in pediatric and community-based care. A child with respiratory symptoms may benefit from both monitoring and remote exam capabilities, particularly when travel to a specialty center is disruptive or impractical. The same is true in rural settings where local teams need tools that support assessment, not just passive tracking.

The operational case for connected care platforms

Organizations with the best RPM outcomes usually build around a connected-care framework. That means devices, data review, escalation, caregiver communication, and documentation are designed together.

When wearables are integrated into a larger platform, teams can standardize who gets monitored, how thresholds are set, and what happens when values change. That reduces avoidable variation. It also gives clinical leadership a clearer path to scale because the program is not dependent on ad hoc staff workarounds.

A connected approach is often more practical for safety-net providers and community-based organizations. These settings do not need technology that adds administrative burden. They need systems that support distributed care, make training manageable, and align with real reimbursement conditions. That is one reason enterprise buyers increasingly look beyond consumer-grade wearables toward solutions built for clinical use, workflow customization, and longitudinal care management.

Dr. Miltie approaches this need through a connected model that combines remote monitoring, virtual exam capability, and care coordination to help organizations extend clinician-directed care into homes, schools, clinics, and underserved community settings.

What matters most in pediatric and rural deployment

Pediatric and rural implementation introduces constraints that generic RPM strategies often miss. In pediatrics, device tolerance, caregiver confidence, and environment all shape adherence. A wearable may be technically accurate, but if it is difficult to place, intimidating for families, or poorly suited to a child with sensory challenges, utilization will drop.

Rural deployment brings different issues. Connectivity may be inconsistent. Staff may wear multiple hats. Patients may have long travel distances and fewer local specialty resources. In those settings, the right RPM program reduces unnecessary visits while preserving escalation pathways for patients who truly need in-person care.

This is why flexible deployment matters. Some organizations need school-based support, some need community clinic workflows, and some need home-based monitoring tied to chronic care management or post-acute follow-up. Wearables should fit the service model, not force the service model to adapt around the device.

Measuring success beyond device adoption

High enrollment numbers can look promising early, but they do not tell the full story. Better metrics include adherence over time, caregiver satisfaction, clinician response efficiency, reduced avoidable utilization, and whether the program expands access for patients who previously struggled to receive follow-up care.

Leadership teams should also ask whether wearable data is improving decision-making. Are clinicians identifying deterioration earlier? Are care coordinators able to intervene before issues escalate? Are families more engaged because monitoring happens in a familiar environment? Those are stronger indicators of value than shipment volume.

Financial sustainability matters too. Programs that ignore reimbursement, staffing costs, and device logistics can become difficult to maintain even when the clinical concept is sound. The most durable models balance patient-centered design with operational discipline.

The future of remote patient monitoring wearables

The next phase is not about adding more sensors for the sake of complexity. It is about making remote data more clinically meaningful and easier to use across real care pathways. That includes better integration with virtual exams, clearer escalation logic, and more tailored deployment for pediatric, chronic care, and rural health populations.

Healthcare organizations do not need wearables that simply collect more numbers. They need tools that support earlier intervention, broader access, and more confident care delivery outside the traditional exam room. When the technology is selected and deployed with that standard in mind, remote monitoring becomes less about devices and more about extending the reach of the care team.

The most effective programs start there: with the patient, the caregiver, and the clinician, all connected by a model that makes care easier to deliver and easier to receive.

The post Remote Patient Monitoring Wearables That Work appeared first on Dr. Miltie.

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Connect for Health Act of 2021 Reintroduced

Tuesday, June 22, 2021

On 29 April 2021, Senator Brian Schatz (D-HI) reintroduced the Creating Opportunities Now for Necessary and Effective Care Technologies (CONNECT) for Health Act of 2021, S. 1512 (the Act).¹ The bill, which currently has 59 cosponsors in the Senate,² aims to codify the currently expanded access to telehealth services provided for by the current Section 1135 waivers due to the COVID-19 public health emergency (PHE), in addition to other measures that support the provision of telehealth care. Prior to implementation of the Section 1135 waivers, telehealth visits were only reimbursable by Medicare under narrow circumstances, including the requirements that the services generally be provided in a designated rural area and from a qualifying originating site, which did not include a beneficiary’s home.³

BACKGROUND AND CONGRESSIONAL FINDINGS

Senator Schatz has introduced the Act in some form each session since 2016, but each time with the stated goal of reducing barriers to accessing telehealth services. This year, the effort is buoyed by the increased utilization of telehealth services during the PHE. After over a year of patients accessing quality care under the current waivers, the case for making the changes permanent is much easier to make. At this time, the text of the legislation has not been made publicly available, but the bill has been referred to the Senate Committee on Finance. Representative Mike Thompson (D-CA-5) has introduced the House of Representatives counterpart, where it is currently under review by the Committee on Finance.⁴

The findings in the Act acknowledge the value of telehealth services, including expanded access to health care, improved quality of care, reduced costs, and strengthening of the health care workforce expertise. The successful expansion of telehealth services during the COVID-19 PHE appears to have also heavily influenced the revised bill. In particular, the bill specifically states that the COVID-19 PHE demonstrated the benefits of telehealth, including reducing risk of infection for patients and providers and conserving space in facilities, and noted that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has recommended that “telehealth services should be optimized, when available and appropriate, during the pandemic.”⁵

REMOVING BARRIERS TO TELEHEALTH COVERAGE

The Act, which is also supported by over 150 advocacy and health organizations, acknowledges that practitioners can provide high-quality telehealth services in a safe and effective manner. As such, the legislation primarily seeks to promote higher quality of care, expanded access to telehealth services, and reduced Medicare spending through relaxation of current reimbursement rules and expanded coverage of additional telehealth services.

Specifically, the Act would amend the Social Security Act to promote the continued expansion of telehealth services by providing for the following:

• Permanently removing all geographic restrictions on telehealth services;
• Expanding the definition of originating site to include the home of an individual and granting the secretary additional flexibility to establish other sites as originating sites where deemed appropriate;
• Removing restrictions on the use of telehealth in emergency medical care;
• Requiring revisions to current process to add telehealth services in order to prioritize the addition of services that provide improved access to care;
• Permitting temporary coverage of certain telehealth services, in order to determine the potential benefit of covering such telehealth services permanently;
• Permanently adding federally qualified health centers and rural health clinics as eligible distant site providers;
• Removing restrictions on Indian Health Service and Native Hawaiian health care system facilities; and
• Allowing for recertification of hospice beneficiaries via telehealth.

The proposed Act also provides the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) secretary with permanent authority to waive certain requirements for reimbursement of telehealth, including a qualifying originating site, geographic location requirements, limitations on the type of technology used, limitations on the types of practitioners that can furnish telehealth services, and limitations on the types of services provided via telehealth, subject to a finding that such waivers would adversely impact quality of care. 

The Act also requires the implementation of processes for public comment and periodic review and reassessment of such waivers, as well as public reporting on the impact and number of beneficiaries benefitting from the waivers.

Note that the expansion of Medicare reimbursement under the Act does not otherwise preempt licensure or geographic, technology or patient informed consent requirements that individual state licensing boards and other regulatory authorities may impose on licensed practitioners or change whether the appropriate standard of professional care is able to be met through a telemedicine encounter.

PROGRAM INTEGRITY

The Act includes multiple provisions to ensure program integrity by providing additional funding to the HHS office of Inspector General (OIG) for oversight of telehealth services through audits, investigations, and other oversight and enforcement activities. In addition, the Act establishes that the provision of technology to Medicare beneficiaries for the purpose of telehealth services, remote patient monitoring, and other digital health services is not considered “remuneration” under the prohibition on inducements provision of the Civil Monetary Penalties Law, provided certain conditions are met. Finally, the Act requires the Secretary to make available provider and beneficiary education resources on telehealth, including on reimbursement requirements, telehealth-specific privacy and security, and utilizing telehealth to engage and support underserved and high-risk populations.

DATA AND TESTING OF MODELS

The Act requires the Secretary to collect and analyze qualitative and quantitative data on the impact of telehealth services and other services utilizing digital health technology permitted under the COVID-19 PHE waivers and provided under alternative payment models and to report to Congress on the conclusions resulting from the collection and analysis of such data. Finally, the Act authorizes a testing model to evaluate allowing additional health care practitioners to provide telehealth services and encourages the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Innovation Center to develop and test telehealth models under the Medicare program.

The post Creating Opportunities Now for Necessary and Effective Care Technologies (CONNECT) for Health Act of 2021 appeared first on Dr. Miltie.

May 4, 2021 – Canistota, SD – On Monday, FCC Commissioner Brendan Carr applauded legislation introduced in the Senate that would make permanent telehealth flexibilities that were made available during the COVID-19 pandemic and expand coverage of telehealth services.

The Creating Opportunities Now for Necessary and Effective Care Technologies (CONNECT) for Health Act of 2021, introduced by Senators Thune, Schatz, Wicker, Cardin, Warner, and Hyde-Smith on behalf of a bipartisan group of 50 senators, would permanently remove geographic restrictions on telehealth services, permanently allow health centers and rural health clinics to provide telehealth services, allow for the waiver of telehealth restrictions during future public health emergencies, and require a study to learn more about how telehealth has been used during the current COVID-19 pandemic.

Commissioner Carr has been leading the FCC’s efforts to develop telehealth initiatives, including the Connected Care Pilot Program, and issued the following statement:

“Three years ago, we identified a new trend in telehealth.  With smartphones and other connected devices, Americans could access health care services right from their homes or anywhere they have an Internet connection.  It was the health care equivalent of moving from Blockbuster to Netflix.  Since that time, I have been working with FCC colleagues and stakeholders to support this new trend.  Back then, we had no way of knowing that the COVID-19 pandemic would bring the benefits of telehealth services into such sharp focus.  But as the pandemic hit, the FCC took immediate and sustained action to ensure that our rules did not frustrate delivery of these important services.

“I expect that the momentum for delivering care directly to patients outside the confines of brick-and-mortar facilities will continue to build well after this devastating pandemic ends.  And as the reliance on telehealth technology continues to grow, it is critically important that these services are accessible regardless of the location of the patient, which is particularly important in rural areas.  I applaud Senator Thune and his colleagues for advancing this important, bipartisan legislation that will permanently remove unnecessary red tape and permanently expand access to telehealth technology throughout the country.”

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The home health industry hasn’t given up on securing telehealth reimbursement during the public health emergency. Their tenacity is being rewarded with recent legislative movement on Capitol Hill.

A group of bipartisan Senators on Thursday introduced S. 1309, the new version of the Home Health Emergency Access to Telehealth (HEAT) Act under the current Congress. The HEAT Act was previously introduced in both the House and Senate last October.

“The COVID-19 pandemic has firmly demonstrated the value of telehealth as a tool in meeting the clinical needs of home health patients,” National Association for Home Care & Hospice President William A. Dombi told Home Health Care News. “However, with the absence of any reimbursement for telehealth, home health agencies have not had the ability to make full use of it.”

Progress on in-home telehealth reimbursement has been a top legislative priority for the Washington, D.C.-based NAHC since last fall.

The advocacy organization described the current lack of telehealth reimbursement in home health care as a “glaring shortcoming in the era of the coronavirus pandemic.”

Similar to last year’s version, the new HEAT Act gives CMS the authority to issue a waiver that would allow for telehealth visits to count towards in-person visits as included on the plan of care only during a public health emergency. The COVID-19 public health emergency is expected to last throughout 2021, so such an action could be a huge difference-maker for home health agencies.

If enacted, the HEAT Act would help providers meet rising demand for home health services as a time when the supply of nurses and other in-home care professionals is at a premium. The bill’s potential passage would also allow agencies to conserve personal protective equipment (PPE) and minimize person-to-person contact during future outbreaks in any given area.

Senators Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Ben Cardin (D-Md.) introduced the original HEAT Act in 2020. 

They teamed up again this year, with backing from Senators Roger Marshall (R-Ky.) and Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.).

“The HEAT Act is a big step forward in modernizing the Medicare home health benefit,” Dombi said. “We thank the senators for their bipartisan sponsorship of the bill and look forward to an early passage.”

While the HEAT Act has overwhelming support in the home health industry, some skeptics have raised concerns about the overuse of virtual care when in-person visits are needed.

The new version of the legislation has a built-in mechanism to prevent that scenario, according to NAHC.

“During the drafting, concerns were raised of the need for patient protections to ensure for protection against fraudulent and improper behavior,” a NAHC analysis states. “To assuage these concerns, guardrails were added that would require for patient consent for telehealth services, as well as a requirement that telehealth visits can [account for] no more than half of all visits.”

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HELP IS ONLY A
BUTTON CLICK AWAY

The V.ALRT is a wearable help button that can be carried discreetly in a pocket or a bag, worn on the wrist, or around the neck as a pendant. The V.ALRT uses Bluetooth® SMART technology in association with a mobile application, to initiate calls and text
messages from a smartphone. With the push of the V.ALRT help button, your smartphone sends a personalized text message and GPS location to up to three pre-selected contacts.

WATERPROOF, LIFEPROOF

The V.ALRT Personal Alert Button is IP67 Compliant. This means the V.ALRT can go where ever you go. Whether that is
outdoors, to the pool, or even to the shower or bathtub

ANDROID & IOS COMPATIBLE

The V.ALRT works with iPhone 4S/iOS 7 or newer and any smartphone using Android 4.3 or newer with Bluetooth 4.0.

NO CHARGING NEEDED

The V.ALRT has up to one year of battery life and powered by a standard CR2032 watch battery. The battery is removable and replaceable by the user.

OUT OF RANGE NOTIFICATION

If the V.ALRT device travels out-of-range from the smartphone, both devices will receive an audio notification.

NO MONTHLY FEES

Since the V.ALRT operates through your smartphone, all of the features are available without any monthly service fees.

FALL DETECTION

The user can turn on Fall Detection to enable the alert to be sent automatically after a 60 second countdown.

GPS LOCATION

In addition to the alert text messages and phone calls, the location from your smartphone will be sent to your emergency contacts.

TEXT AND CALL

After pressing the button, the V.ALRT transmits a command to your smartphone to send a text message to your preset  contacts, followed by phone calls. This alert behavior is completely customizable.

WIRELESS RANGE

The V.ALRT must be within range of your smartphone to operate. It has a wireless range of up to 75′ indoor or up to 300′ outdoor using Bluetooth 4.0.

PRODUCT SPECS

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