Health Affairs: Telemedicine’s Impact on Use, Spending, And Quality

Health Affairs: Telemedicine’s Impact on Use, Spending, And Quality

To inform the ongoing debate about whether to continue payment for telemedicine visits, researchers from Harvard University, and RAND Corporation conducted a study on telemedicine use across health systems with utilization, spending, and quality. In 2021–22, relative to those in the lowest quartile, Medicare patients of health systems in the highest quartile had an increase of 0.21 total outpatient visits (telemedicine and in-person) per patient per year (2.2 percent relative increase), a decrease of 14.4 annual non-COVID-19 emergency department visits per 1,000 patients per year (2.7 percent relative decrease), a $248 increase in per patient per year spending (1.6 percent relative increase), and increased adherence for metformin and statins. Researchers found that give concerns that telemedicine’s convenience will lead to more visits, the relatively small increase in visits that was observed was surprising.