Essay Sample on Rural Population and Telehealth

Introduction

My innovation on Rural Population and Telehealth would be the connection between telehealth and rural population and how it will help solve healthcare problems in the rural areas. In my research, I found out that telehealth is one of the most significant tools that can be implemented and used effectively to leave a significant mark in the field of healthcare. This mark is by expanding and easing the quality of healthcare that is available in rural areas to serve the rural population. In the rural areas of our countries, most people live under poor conditions, which makes it hard for them to travel to decent healthcare facilities.

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Telehealth would involve use of modern telecommunication technology and electronic information by the population and healthcare providers to provide long-distance healthcare. The means of communication may involve video conferencing that is interactive with the patient, store-and-forwarding imaging and remote monitoring. Education sessions are also a part of the communication means that telehealth adopts. Such guides will enable the healthcare providers interacting with the rural population to pass information regarding the subject matter intended by the parties. This innovation can be boosted through funding from the Office for the Advancement of Telehealth to aid its implementation.

Resource centers that are concerned with the telehealth assessment and policing should be upgraded to cater for the telehealth and healthcare provision for the rural population. For telehealth and rural community to work effectively, specific requirements have to be met. These requirements include sufficient staff members to oversee a smooth operation of telehealth and its service provision in rural areas (Dewar et al., 2017). The staff and the public should be educated on how to use the system and its benefits to embrace it more. There should also be an effective credentialing and licensing of the healthcare providers and specialists to have a sufficient and smooth operation of telehealth in rural population.

The Problem my Innovation Solves

Telehealth is an innovation that is aimed at driving the volumes of rural populations, minimizing the costs involved in readmissions and department visits that are unnecessary. Telehealth also aims at improving the quality of healthcare as well as enabling the small healthcare facilities in rural areas to continue dispensing high-end medical care. The most significant problem that the innovation aims to solve is easing the traveling burdens that the rural populations bear in their quest for high-quality medical care. It will also be cheap and economical in using the telehealth system instead of staffing the rural healthcare facilities with physical providers.

The interaction between the healthcare providers and rural population will be virtual and is more feasible. The interaction will help improve access to medical care to rural communities. Some of the types of specialties that telehealth will target include psychiatry, cardiology, dental care, radiology, obstetrics, ophthalmology, and audiology. Other specialties that telehealth will focus on the rural population is dermatology and oncology. The innovation of telehealth on the rural community will work effectively in the provision of numerous services for a wide range of patients.

One of the services that are aimed at by the telehealth is chronic care management. This type of service will enable patients in rural areas to use integrated care in various fields. Emergency care is another type of service that will be impacted positively by the telehealth. This impact in emergency services will include timely access to healthcare providers by the patients such as those suffering from stroke and related conditions. The intensive care unit is also expected to be improved by telehealth innovation. Specialists and qualified nurses will be able to monitor the health conditions of patients in the intensive care unit promptly. These include those in rural areas.

Other services that are expected to be improved by the telehealth in urban areas are home monitoring for the for patients in rural areas instead of physical home visits by medical providers. For the old part of the rural population, long-term care will be benefited by the telehealth innovation as they will access care from their homes. This innovation means that older adults in rural areas with chronic diseases will not need to be continually traveling amid difficulties. Other services that are expected to be improved by telehealth for the rural population is telepharmacy for drug prescriptions and interpreter services.

The Selected Population and Community to be Served

My innovation is targeting about 20% of the Americans that live in rural areas. The actual figure that lives in the rural areas is approximately 50 million people in America. Despite having such an enormous population living in rural areas, less than 10 percent of the qualified health providers are deployed to serve in these areas. The result of this shortage is that many of the population living in rural areas receive insufficient healthcare attention. This shortage of healthcare providers sees many people living in rural areas becoming more susceptible to infections and other related disorders. Telehealth innovation may prevent deaths that occur due to this trend. The emergence of telehealth for the rural populations will, therefore, use telecommunication technologies to provide high-end education and other services. The implementation of telehealth technology will ensure that the public and healthcare providers have the necessary tools and platform for increasing the quality of healthcare. The innovation will see the healthcare services and consultations being used widely in geographically remote areas to suit the rural population.

References

Dewar, A. R., Bull, T. P., Malvey, D. M., & Szalma, J. L. (2017). Developing a measure of engagement with telehealth systems: the mHealth technology engagement index. Journal of telemedicine and telecare, 23(2), 248-255.Retrieved from https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1357633X16640958