"The pandemic is over" /s

Same attitude about remote work. Now that "the pandemic is over" businesses are dragging their workers back into the office.

I saw a story about respiratory syncytial virus in children on the news this morning and I tell you what, if a kid gets that, and COVID on top of it, and that's exactly the perfect storm some are predicting for the winter... that's going to be a catastrophe. and all the short-term thinkers who reactively run everything, it seems, will be responsible for all kinds of death and chronic illness.

I don't know why we can't be smarter than this. A multitude of tech devices we call "smart" with brains no smarter than a cockroach (or, ok, if they have network-aware AI, a dog) and we can't muster enough human smarts to figure out how to put aside the pursuit of infinite profit and do some things that benefit all of society. Especially, it seems, when it's an actual emergency.

Just had a telemedicine appointment today — it’s amazing for disabled people. A doctor’s trip that used to take all day + a day of recovery took 45 minutes today.

By contrast they’ve already ended telemedicine appointment for established pain patients here. New patients I can understand, but my doctor has known me for years and going in once a month vs. once every 3 months for a UA made no difference. Now their clinic is overwhelmed again and delays are back.

Huge quality of life improvement for the disabled, so it makes sense they’d kill it off.

But, insurance companies are killkng it off.

fixed it.

Around rural NW Oklahoma, I can see it sticking around longer than most others. It's more convenient for many as to not travel half an hour from town to town for an appointment, especially for elderly.

The other day I chose to use it, just to follow up on new meds I'm taking, to see how I was feeling. I was able to continue doing things at home while waiting for the doctor to connect.

I doubt this would slide with many other places of work, I'm sure my work wouldn't mind I continued working at my desk while "on hold" to talk to my doctor, then step away when connected. Less down time of my work, and more pay towards my pocket, all around less expenses. I can only imagine it's faster and easier (some exceptions) for the doctors.

I use telemedicine regularly and it beats the hell out of sitting in a doctor office waiting room for an hour just to review test results and get recommendations. I can go to a testing lab for blood and urine work, to an imaging center for scans and then just meet remotely with the doc for a review. The in person exam is occasionally necessary but not for just a consultation

I’m a Nurse Practitioner and I love me some telemed. Prior to going to school to be an NP, I actually wanted to do house calls. For the convenience to the patient and I even did a house call clinical rotation. I still think that’s better than the now accepted doctor’s office model but telemedicine is even more convenient. A lot of what you do with your provider is based on interview or review of diagnostic tests vs actual physical exam. If you don’t literally need to be looked at, that visit can be a tele visit. Of course there are limitations with things like annual physicals which do require a thorough exam. But a lot of visits can be completed as a televisit and this increases to just about 100% when it comes to psych visits. Very rarely does a person need to physically come to the office for one of these visits.

The real newest trend though is asynchronous. Where you place a request with a provider over some platform. They review and either fill a medication for you, ask for more info or deny you based on info you provided. I see that expanding greatly in the future.

It's simple hospitals/Pharma want more money. Telemedicine allows doctors and patients to reduce unnecessary expenditure.

AI psych health does not work, as of yet. They exist, but told a tester who provided suicidal thoughts “When I’m feeling down I like to curl up in my jammies”

most likely it’s too difficult to properly bill, seems like an opportunity rife with fraud

its the same as online teaching. its easier and faster but the quality of the teaching or providing medicinic help goes way down

Good riddance. I don’t want a doctor literally phoning it in. Slowly we’re also pushed to big box stores for healthcare. Get your shots at the drugstore, and pretty soon it’ll be turn your head and cough, oh don’t mind the line of gawkers… We are hurtling towards Idiocracy. We needed universal healthcare ten years ago.