The Quickstart Guide to Telehealth

Telehealth has been taking off in the past few years, and it’s time to catch up if you haven’t already. This guide is for those that want to incorporate telehealth into their practice, and those just starting will find it helpful as well. The telehealth industry is projected to attain a valuation of $53.1 billion by 2026. With the arrival of COVID-19, however, it is safe to assume this industry will be here to stay.

This article is going to help those who are just starting with their telehealth career. I hope to provide useful information for all the major steps, as well as a resource that you can come back to.

Table of Contents

• Educate Yourself
• Define Your Goals
• Find Your Favorite Telehealth Apps
• Acquire the Proper Equipment

Educate Yourself

I am a firm believer that one must educate themselves on a subject or idea before committing to it. I’ve written some articles in the past on some books that you may find useful here and here, but I want to elaborate on some other topics.

You should familiarize yourself with the laws of telehealth first. These vary by state, so use a resource like the Center for Connected Health Policy. Due to COVID-19, these laws and legislature are changing rapidly, so keep a lookout for any changes in your state. You should also look into the state laws for NPs scope of practice. Barton Associates provides a great resource with this Scope of Practice Wheel, which is a great summary of state restrictions for NPs.

I’d also like to recommend this book and others like it. Many may struggle with adapting to a Work from Homestyle, so reading up on some latest tips and practices will certainly help guide you into a successful practice. I like this book because it’s written by a woman who’s experienced in the subject of teleworking. It’s a great way to get an overview of things you’ll need to learn for any remote business, like team building and tools for working efficiently.

Define Your Goals

Before you begin your telehealth program, ensure that your goals are realistic and defined. Like any practice, you’ll want to determine how telehealth will impact things like revenue and billing policies. Other things you’ll want to consider are patient no-shows, wait times, billing policies, and everything else that goes into expanding your practice.

Furthermore, consider what specialty you’ll want to consider working in with telemedicine. Many medical specialties are able to transition into a full or partial remote setting. Some that may surprise you, like tele-OB/GYN and teletrauma. Others will come to mind like cardiology, pediatrics, and mental health.

Find Your Favorite Telehealth Apps

You will want to do some digging to find the telehealth platform that works best for you. Preference in technology can be a finicky thing and I always recommend using what you feel most comfortable with. To help you get started if you’re unsure, here are two that I’ve found to be useful for telehealth practices.

NextGen Healthcare will help you manage and transition your workflow from the office to home. This program is integrated with your EHR/PM to allow for a smooth transition in your workflow. One pro that many enjoy is the ease of use this program offers, this will help reduce any frustrations or the learning curve of a new program. It also offers robust practice management to help with billing, record keeping and more.

Chiron Health is a HIPAA-compliant agency that provides everything you’ll need for your telehealth practice. This app is perfect for integrating your scheduled patients into your remote office and working with them seamlessly. Your videos through this service will all be HIPAA-compliant and reimbursement tools are readily available for private payers. Just like NextGen, this app also provides EHR/PM integration and will help you keep track of your billing.

Acquire the Proper Equipment

Finally, we arrive at what equipment you’ll need. Now that all of the planning and research has been done, it’s time to have some fun with electronic shopping. You will have a few options for your equipment of choice, but there are a few baseline things you’ll need.

Obviously, you will need a computer and a web camera to start working with telehealth. I’ve written an article here on PCs you’ll find useful as well as specifications you’ll want to keep an eye out for. To sum it up though, you’ll want to focus on hard drive space, RAM, and your processor. Specifically, you need to look for a PC with an SSD (solid-state drive), at least 8 gigs of RAM, and preferably the most recent processor. Here’s one for only $600 that will cover all you need at a basic level. One that is going to run more than $1000 but will for sure provide everything you need and more from a PC is this Lenovo. Many of these are going to include a web camera if you’re purchasing a laptop, but if not, make sure to get one that supports 1080p resolution at the minimum.

I hope all of this has been useful to you, and please let me know in the comments if anything can be improved or added to this article.

Also, if you’re interested, please join my private LinkedIn Group. This is a new community of nurses that I created just for us to discuss, learn, and network.

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