Virtual Care In Emergency Transport Isn’t New
Much of the American public first saw remote care in ambulances on the 1970s television show “Emergency!”. Fictional paramedics, John Gage and Roy Desoto of LA County’s stalwart Squad 51, would be dispatched to the scene of an emergency and connect with doctors at Rampart Hospital via their Biophone 3502. Inevitably, a doctor would instruct them to, “Start an IV, D5W, TKO!” The show was fictional but the Biophone was real and allowed paramedics to communicate vital health information to the local doctors.
The BIOPHONE 3502
Today, remote care in ambulances looks a lot different. Fortunately, the devices are a lot smaller, and a broader spectrum of vital health information can be communicated virtually. Late last year, The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid (CMS) created the Emergency Triage, Treat, and Transport (ET3) payment model to improve the flexibility of emergency response and transport companies when they respond to 911 calls from Medicare Fee-for-Service (FFS) beneficiaries. This new program helps to simplify the addition of virtual care into emergency medical transport technology.
In addition to the traditional model of transporting a Medicare beneficiary to the ED, there are two new options available to emergency transport companies. First is transporting the patient to an alternative destination partner (such as a primary care clinic or an urgent care clinic) and second, treating the patient on-site with a qualified healthcare partner, who is either on the scene or is connected by virtual care. The most economical option with Treat-On-Site is to use telemedicine. Hiring and putting a qualified healthcare provider on each vehicle is cost prohibitive.
Here is how it works:
eVisit Enterprise Virtual Care is the best choice with ET3
Virtual on-site triage
If a situation arises where your team needs additional input or guidance, virtual care allows them to contact an approved healthcare provider to assist in triage. Your team can then transport the patient to an alternative site or, if feasible, treat them onsite. Either way, the patient gets the appropriate care, and you get reimbursed!
Established Partnerships
Because you can leverage your relationships with local hospitals and EDs, your onsite teams will be working with healthcare professionals and providers they know. Unlike other virtual care solutions that use a round-robin approach with their network of providers from all over the country, the eVisit Enterprise Virtual Care platform allows direct communication with the same teams day in, and day out in an established partnership.
No Extra Hardware or Third-Party Equipment
With a highly-configurable enterprise virtual care platform, like eVisit you keep your hardware and peripherals. You don’t have to buy proprietary devices and incur more unnecessary costs. You can use the laptops and tablets you already have, and diagnostic peripherals that have a standard input interface will work.
Workflows that fit your needs
There is no reason you should have to conform to inflexible workflows imposed by platforms that don’t understand your business. The eVisit Enterprise Virtual Care platform has flexibility and configurability built into it, to allow you to continue using your unique workflows with little to no change or interruption, keeping your established efficiency firmly in place.
4 Reasons to Choose eVisit Enterprise Virtual Care Platform
As you research the options in virtual care, keep in mind that the eVisit Virtual Care platform:
- Accommodates your unique workflows, regardless of complexity, with more than 150 points of configuration.
- Provides you HD-quality, enterprise-grade video that works within stringent firewalls and security policies, with nothing else to download.
- Offers you unlimited access to technical support to help you through your journey—onboarding and beyond.
- Won’t require you to purchase extra hardware or third-party equipment
Download our Definitive Guide to Purchasing a Telemedicine Platform and find out why eVisit Enterprise Virtual Care platform can help you maximize your ET3 efforts by scheduling a consultation with one of our virtual care experts.
