Urgent Care Boomed at the Expense of Telehealth and the ED from 2020 to 2021

You might assume that utilization of telehealth continued what had been steady growth in the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic. You’d be mistaken, however. In fact, telehealth claim lines actually plummeted by 76% from 2020 to 2021, according to the FH Healthcare Indicators and FH Medical Price Index 2023 report. At the same time, it goes on to say, urgent care claim lines jumped 14% while ambulatory surgical centers dropped 7% and emergency room claim lines fell 15%. It should be noted that, according to the report, the surprising drop in telehealth followed a 5-year period—ending in the first year of the pandemic—during which national telehealth utilization grew 5,017%. Equally reflective of the times is the fact that COVID-19 was among the most common diagnoses in urgent care, retail clinics, telehealth, and emergency rooms for patients over 22 years of age.