Providers used to make house calls and would show up on your doorsteps with that iconic little “black bag”; those days have long been a thing of the past. However, telemedicine is reviving the conveyance of house calls. Instead of the provider arriving at your door, they are arriving on a tablet, smartphone and other wireless tools via a mobile app, on a video-chat. Telemedicine is a virtual visit that allows a healthcare provider to evaluate, diagnose and treat a patient from any location that has intranet. However, telemedicine has drastically changed from its inception. Hospitals started using telemedicine approximately fifty years ago to reach their patients in …show more content…
By utilizing telemedicine for clinical consultations and appointment, it removes the need for the patients to travel, avoiding travel distance of approximately five million miles. The time savings averages out to a savings of nearly nine years of time traveled and roughly an additional three million in travel costs (Casey, C., & Davis, 2017). Telemedicine is also saving money by decreasing the readmission rates by improving follow-up care. The cost spent by hospitals on readmissions is estimated to be $26 billion annually by the federal government. Hospitals are reducing the cost with improving care management and follow up care on chronically ill and post-surgical patients (How Hospitals Are Reducing Medical Costs with Telehealth,