Has Telemedicine’s ‘Moment’ Come and Gone?

As JUCM News readers may recall, use of telemedicine services has increased dramatically—and fallen precipitously—at various times during the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. Some urgent care operators have tried to ride the wave, while others have continued to act (or not act) based on their skepticism of the medium’s viability in the urgent care setting. Now it appears that the investment community may be weighing in with its collective opinion on the future of virtual care, as shares of a major telehealth platform have fallen roughly 83% recently. There just doesn’t seem to be confidence that the large number of patients wanting to get online instead of visiting a local healthcare provider during COVID social distancing will be sustainable as fears die down. That notion is supported by research, in fact, as Experity has found that only 20% of patients who accessed telemedicine for an “urgent care issue” during the pandemic say they would use it again for another urgent care issue.