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There are not enough primary care doctors in America,
especially in rural areas. Our advances in telemedicine
make access to health care easier.
Within 10 years, the U.S. health system is expected
to need an additional 45,000 primary care physicians.
Many areas of the nation and a number of medical
specialties are already reporting a scarcity of
physicians, according to the American Association
of Medical Colleges. The effects of this shortage
are perhaps most acute in rural areas. While
approximately 20 percent of the U.S. population
lives in rural areas, only 9 percent of U.S. physicians
practice in these communities.
In collaboration with Cisco, UnitedHealth Group
has introduced high-resolution teleconferencing
technology and digitalized diagnostic equipment
to establish the first national telehealth network
to enable physicians to see and diagnose patients
face-to-face when in-person visits are not feasible. For example, together with the state of Colorado
and Centura Health, a large hospital system, we
are expanding physicians’ reach into underserved
communities across the state.
“I just said it can’t be possible,” recalls Gale Garrison,
59-year-old resident of rural Lamar, Colorado, who has
worked all his life on livestock feed lots in Colorado
and Nebraska. “It just really doesn’t make sense,
does it? How could someone hundreds of miles away
tell you what’s going on with you?”
After his first visit with a pulmonologist who
was sitting 200 miles away in suburban Denver,
Garrison became a believer. “It was an eye-opening
experience,” says Garrison. “It felt like the doctor was
right there in the room with me. This is something
Lamar has needed for a long time.”
Like most of Lamar’s 9,000 residents, Garrison faced
challenges accessing specialty care. In the early 1990s,
he was diagnosed with chronic obstructive pulmonary
disease. To see a lung specialist, Garrison had to make a three-hour drive to Colorado Springs. The distance,
hassle and expense of the trip kept Garrison from
seeing a pulmonologist for three years—until his
Connected Care visit in fall 2010.
Using Connected Care, Garrison was treated by
Dr. Thomas Bost of Critical Care, Pulmonary & Sleep
Associates in suburban Denver. Dr. Bost says his first
visit with Garrison resembled many such visits via
Connected Care.
“The first visit is almost always emotional, witnessing
faces of patients who walk in skeptics and walk
away believers in the ability of this technology to
open access to care in a way they never would have
imagined,” said Dr. Bost. “Gale was no exception.”
Garrison also suffers from heart problems. Today, the
nearest cardiologist is based 100 miles away from
Lamar in Pueblo, and Garrison makes monthly trips to
see him. Encouraged by his experience with Connected
Care to treat his lung condition, Garrison is planning to
start using the technology to manage his heart disease.
Connected Care is also proving to be a popular
professional tool for physicians. For the past year,
Dr. Randy Taylor and other physicians in his Denver-area
practice have used Connected Care to see
patients in Lamar and another rural town, Del Norte.
The majority of their patients are Mexican-Americans,
many struggling with poverty and the language barrier
in accessing health care, in addition to the challenge
of their remote locations.
“It’s an empowering experience for the patient who
has never had such convenient access to quality
specialty care before,” said Dr. Taylor, an ear, nose
and throat specialist. “But it’s just as empowering
for us to be able to help patients we could not
reach before.”
In Lamar, Garrison now spends his days looking after
his eight grandchildren, who he says will have better
access to care than he did growing up—in large part
because of Connected Care.
“It gives me hope knowing I can see a doctor when I
need to,” Garrison says. “And that these children will, too.”
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Video
Connected Care helps bring primary and specialty care to rural and underserved urban communities.
Garrison's pulmonologist is 200 miles away from Lamar in suburban Denver, while the nearest cardiologist is based 100 miles away in Pueblo.
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