Telehealth accounts for 8% of health care visits
Use has declined since its peak but remains ahead of pre-pandemic levels.
Although the use of telehealth recently has tapered off, the pandemic helped secure its place as a viable option for patients, physicians and insurers.
Before the pandemic, most employer health plans provided at least some coverage for services delivered through telehealth, but few enrollees used these services. Social distancing led many providers to deliver more services remotely. Governments and payers sought to maintain access to care during this period by removing regulatory barriers and reforming payment policies. As a result, telehealth use surged early in the pandemic.
Related: 5 virtual health care trends driving employers’ health care strategies
The Peterson-KFF HealthSystemTracker analyzed data from March 2019 through August 2021 to determine the impact of increased telehealth use on access, cost, quality and outcomes. Among the findings:
Outpatient telehealth visits have declined since the early months of the pandemic. Telehealth use soared from less than 1% of outpatient visits before the pandemic to 13% in the first six months. This rate declined to 11% during the next six-month period and then to 8% a year into the pandemic.
The total number of outpatient visits has returned to pre-pandemic levels, but telehealth visits remain elevated. With increased use of in-person care in the most recent months of the pandemic, the share of outpatient visits delivered through telehealth has decreased to about 60% of what it was during the first six months of the pandemic.
Younger patients had higher telehealth uptake and have continued using telehealth at higher rates than the elderly. Older adults had lower retention of telehealth since the pandemic peak and have continued to have used telehealth for outpatient visits less than children and younger adults.
Rural and urban patients used telehealth at similar rates. Urban and rural residents had similar shares of telehealth outpatient visits in the first six months of the pandemic. By the spring and summer of 2021, telehealth visits in both urban and rural areas had declined to 8% and 10% of visits, respectively.
Men and women used outpatient telehealth visits at similar rates. Eight percent of women’s and 7% of men’s outpatient visits were conducted through telehealth.
Telehealth use for chronic condition management has decreased but remains above pre-pandemic levels. In the first six months of the pandemic, more than one in six outpatient visits for a primary diagnosis of obesity, asthma, hypertension, diabetes or thyroid disorders were delivered through telehealth. In the year after, the share of outpatient visits that include a primary diagnosis for a chronic condition has declined substantially.
“Telehealth has played a large role in addressing health needs during the COVID-19 pandemic, particularly when in-person services were delayed or postponed to avoid potential spread of COVID-19 at health sites,” the report concluded. “Governments, payers and employers acted to make telehealth more accessible through changes in payment, coverage and licensing policies.
“Providers also increasingly adopted telehealth as the extent of pandemic disruptions became apparent. These factors combined to significantly increase telehealth access and use among publicly and privately insured people. While before the pandemic telehealth was a negligible share of outpatient visits, services delivered remotely now account for 8% of outpatient visits.”
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