Schmitt-Thompson Clinical Content Helps Pave the Telemedicine Road

Schmitt-Thompson, the world’s leading nurse triage guidelines, played a critical role during the 2020 pandemic outbreak.

Working hand-in-hand with the Center for Disease Control (CDC), the organization updated its clinical protocols throughout the COVID-19 outbreak. Their efforts helped protect both patients and their families, as well as frontline healthcare workers.

In recognition of telemedicine’s growing role in the medical industry, Schmitt‐Thompson Clinical Content updated its nurse triaging services processes to ensure appropriate patient dispositions. The new clinical process includes decision support for referring patients to telemedicine evaluation and management.

Updated Telemedicine Nurse Triage Processes: Two Key Improvements Included in the Schmitt-Thompson Clinical Guidelines

• Individual triage assessment questions (TAQs) include tagging a patient as telemedicine eligible*.By tagging specific patient triage questions, telehealth nurses receive better decision support to better identify eligible patients for safe telemedicine referrals.  
• Newly added set of alternative telemedicine dispositions.Triage nurses will have the option to use these individual dispositions for patients as part of the normal telehealth triage process. 

Telemedicine Is Now a Necessary Healthcare Option

Telemedicine services have benefited healthcare professionals, as well as patients seeking care, especially in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. Since the start of the epidemic, the healthcare landscape has changed significantly, and it shows. Remote patient engagement is up by 225%, according to a report by Medscape. Now more than ever, patients realize the benefits of telemedicine, including less time in the waiting room, elimination of child and elder care issues, transportation costs and time, access to specialists, and so much more. 

Fierce Healthcare

As healthcare practices continue, and for some transition, to provide virtual care,  patient access to care should not falter and remain top of mind. Virtual care should ensure safe and valuable care, as well as be offered as an in-house branded telehealth service to keep patient experiences consistent. 

If you are currently outsourcing your medical call center services, ensure that they are using Schmitt-Thompson to give you peace of mind to know that your patients will always receive clinically sound advice and dispositions.

Note:

* According to Schmitt-Thompson, telemedicine eligibility means that a patient with a positive response to TAQ usually can be evaluated and managed in a video telemedicine encounter without referral to another site of care.