Review: COVID-19 and health care’s digital revolution

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Review: COVID-19 and health care’s digital revolution

In this commentary, physicians’ argue for an immediate digital revolution and regulation overhaul to address the surge of COVID-19.

The U.S. health care system needs to move away from its current ill-equipped analogue system to a more robust digital system to effectively address COVID-19. Transforming the current health care delivery system is required to lessen the spread of the virus. To begin this transition, the Office of Civil Rights announced that it will not impose penalties for using HIPAA-noncompliant private communication technologies during this public health emergency. Although an important first step, additional steps need to be taken, including expanded regulatory relief, reimbursement for new digital services, and evaluation of clinical care provided through these technologies. Exploring different ways of caring for patients is required, including hospital-at-home models; video visits; text, email, and mobile-phone applications; wearable devices; remote-monitoring services; etc. An immediate emergency update of privacy and communication regulations as well as reimbursement structures is necessary so that existing tools can be put to use. Assessing clinical productivity using these new approaches will be critical to understanding whether emergency authorizations should be made permanent after this crisis.

|2020-04-10T10:54:34-04:00April 10th, 2020|COVID-19 Literature|Comments Off on Review: COVID-19 and health care’s digital revolution

About the Author: Maria Brann

Maria Brann
Dr. Maria Brann, PhD, MPH, is a professor in the Department of Communication Studies in the School of Liberal Arts at IUPUI and affiliate faculty with the Injury Control Research Center at West Virginia University. She explores the integration of health, interpersonal, and gender communication. Her translational focus and mixed methods approach are woven throughout her health vulnerabilities research, which advocates for more effective communication to improve people’s health and safety. Her primary research interests focus on the study of women’s and ethical issues in health communication contexts and promotion of healthy lifestyle behaviors to improve personal and public health and safety. She researches communication at both the micro and macro levels and studies how communication influences relationships among individuals and with the social world.

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