A Virtual Care Manager (VCM) is a RN (Registered Nurse) who offers remote support to patients using telehealth or virtual care technology. VCMs can help patients manage their chronic conditions, and help them understand and comply with their care plan or treatment plan, provide medication reconciliation, and facilitate communication with their healthcare providers.
A VCM can significantly improve patient care for a practice in multiple ways. First, VCMs can alleviate the workload of primary care physicians and other healthcare clinicians, enabling their practice to deliver more comprehensive patient care. VCMs can allow patients to receive continuous care, even if they cannot visit their provider’s office.
VCMs can play a vital role in patient education to patients regarding their conditions and treatment address any questions or concerns they may have in regards to their treatment plans. This can enhance patient satisfaction and promote patient engagement, ultimately resulting in improved health outcomes for their patients.
Additionally, VCMs can help coordinate care across various healthcare clinicians and care settings. For example, they can provide prompt follow-up care after ER visits, hospitalizations, or specialist appointments and help to avoid medication errors and other adverse events. This can help ensure patient safety and enhance care transitions, improving patient outcomes.
In conclusion, a VCM can be a highly valuable asset to healthcare practice, contributing to improved patient care, decreased provider workload, and increased patient engagement and satisfaction.
What Is Virtual Care?
- Virtual care involves utilizing technology to deliver healthcare services remotely, which can include virtual monitoring, telemedicine consultations, chronic care management, and remote patient monitoring, education and support.
- Virtual monitoring can involve wearable devices or other remote monitoring technology to monitor patients’ medication adherence, vital signs, and other health data. This information can then be sent to healthcare providers, allowing them to closely monitor patients’ health status and adjust their treatment plans accordingly.
- Telemedicine consultations utilize video conferencing or other communication technology to facilitate real-time interactions between patients and healthcare providers needing video visits. This can be especially beneficial for patients who live in rural or remote areas or those having difficulties traveling.
- Virtual care can also include remote patient support, care coordination and education, which includes providing patients with information about their conditions and treatment plans, addressing their questions and concerns, and facilitating care coordination across different healthcare professionals and settings.
In conclusion, virtual care can enhance access to healthcare services, decrease healthcare costs, and improve patient outcomes. It is particularly helpful in scenarios where in-person visits are impossible or difficult such as elderly patients who are homebound or lack transportation, such as for patients with chronic conditions requiring continuous monitoring and support or during a pandemic.
How is Virtual Care Carried out in a Home Setting?
Virtual care can be conducted in the comfort of one’s home using diverse technologies to provide connected care, such as smartphones, tablets, or computers, as well as remote monitoring devices and other specialized equipment.
To give virtual care from home, patients usually require a device with a camera and microphone, such as a computer, smartphone, or tablet. However, a video component is not always required and telephone access may be enough depending on the situation. They also need a reliable internet connection to ensure good-quality video and audio for virtual consultations.
Healthcare providers may utilize specialized telemedicine software or platforms to conduct virtual consultations with patients. These platforms often offer secure video conferencing features and tools for sharing medical records and other pertinent information.
Remote monitoring devices can also be used to gather data on patients’ vital signs, such as blood pressure, oxygen saturation, and heart rate. These devices can then send the data to healthcare providers, wherein they can use it to view and monitor patients’ health status and adjust their treatment plans accordingly.
In some instances, specialized equipment may be necessary for virtual care, such as remote diagnostic devices or tools for administering medication or other treatments.
In conclusion, virtual care in a patient’s home requires dependable technology and a secure communication platform. Using the right equipment and tools, virtual care can provide patients access to high-quality health care services from the convenience and comfort of their homes.
Benefits of a Virtual Care Manager to Practitioners
Virtual Care Managers (VCMs) offer several benefits to healthcare practitioners, including:
- Cost Savings: Since VCMs can provide continuous remote support and monitoring to help reduce healthcare costs and the need for ER visits and hospitalizations when issues can be caught early.
- Patient Engagement: VCMs promote patient engagement by addressing patients’ questions and concerns, facilitating communication between patients and their healthcare providers, and through education and support.
- Development of Comprehensive Care Plans: VCMs can assist in the development of a comprehensive care plan for patients to be sent to the provider for review and sign off.
- Improved Care Coordination: VCMs play a vital role in coordinating care among various healthcare professionals and settings, ensuring that patients receive proper follow-up care after ER visits, hospitalizations, or specialist appointments and helping avoid medication errors and other adverse events.
- Improved Patient Outcomes: VCMs can provide patient support and education, helping patients manage their conditions and adhere to their care plans to meet their desired goals. This can ultimately result in improved patient outcomes and increased satisfaction.
- Increased Efficiency: VCMs can enhance the efficiency of healthcare practices by facilitating coordination and communication between patients and providers and ensuring that patients receive regular, appropriate care.
- Workload Reduction: VCMs can alleviate the workload of healthcare clinicians by assuming administrative and patient management tasks, enabling practitioners to have an improved work life balance.
In summary, a VCM can be a highly valuable asset to healthcare practitioners, contributing to reduced costs and workload, enhanced patient engagement and satisfaction, improved care coordination and patient outcomes, and increased efficiency.
Benefits of a Care Manager to Patients
A Care Manager can offer a range of benefits to patients, including:
- Support and Education: Care managers can offer patients and their families education and support, help them to gain a better understanding of their conditions and treatment plans and address their questions or concerns.
- Enhanced Care Coordination: Care managers can help coordinate care among various healthcare clinicians and settings, provide patients with the proper follow-up care after ER visits, hospitalizations, or specialist appointments.
- Improved Healthcare Access: Care managers assist patients in navigating the health care system directory and help them receive timely care.
- Improved Quality of Life: Care managers can support patients in managing their chronic conditions effectively, ensuring adherence to their care plans, and facilitating communication with their healthcare providers. This can result in improved quality of life not just for the patients but also for their families and their caregivers..
- Reduced Healthcare Costs: Care managers can contribute to reducing healthcare costs by providing remote support and monitoring, which can help minimize the need for in-person visits, ER visits, and hospitalizations.
- Remote Monitoring: Care managers can utilize remote monitoring technology to monitor patients’ medication adherence, vital signs, glucose levels and other relevant health data and adjust treatment plans accordingly.
Benefits of a Care Manager to Caregivers
Care Managers can offer similar benefits to caregivers, including:
- Care Coordination: Care managers can assist in coordinating care between various healthcare clinicians and settings, ensuring that caregivers are kept informed and actively involved in the care of their loved ones.
- Education Resource and Support: Care managers can educate and support caregivers, helping them to understand their loved one’s condition and treatment plan better and providing information and resources to assist them in their caregiving role.
- Respite Care: Care managers can help arrange respite care for caregivers, providing them a much-needed break from their responsibilities and helping prevent caregiver burnout.
In summary, a care manager can offer a range of benefits to patients and their families, including education and support towards reaching their healthcare goals, remote monitoring, enhanced care coordination, reduced healthcare costs, and improved healthcare access and quality of life. Also, care managers can also offer similar benefits to caregivers, ensuring they receive the necessary resources and support to provide optimal care for the patient.
Benefits of a Care Manager to Veterans
A care manager can offer various benefits to Veterans, including:
- Advocacy: Care managers can serve as Veteran advocates, ensuring that their concerns are heard and their needs are addressed within the VA healthcare system.
- Assistance with navigating the VA healthcare system: Care Managers can assist Veterans in understanding their eligibility, benefits, access to care, and guide them in navigating the complex VA healthcare system.
- Assistance with obtaining VA benefits: Virtual Care Managers can provide support to Veterans in obtaining VA benefits, including help them navigate the appeals and application processes.
- Coordination of care: Care Managers can facilitate care coordination between the VA and other healthcare providers, ensuring that Veterans receive coordinated and comprehensive care for their health needs.
- Education and support: Care Managers can offer a Veteran and their family education and support, helping them to understand their health conditions and treatment plans better and addressing their concerns or questions.
- Improved access to mental health services: Care Managers play a crucial role in facilitating Veterans’ access to mental health services, which is particularly important considering the increased PTSD and other mental health conditions with those who were in the military.
In conclusion, a care manager can be a highly valuable asset to Veterans, helping them obtain the care and benefits they need, navigate the VA healthcare system, and improve their overall health and well-being.
What Service Offerings Can Our Practice Offer with Virtual Care?
Virtual Care offers various service offerings for healthcare practices including the following:
- Chronic disease management: Virtual Care assists patients in managing chronic diseases, such as COPD, diabetes, or heart disease, by providing continuous support and education.
- Health education and coaching: Virtual Care can offer health education and coaching to patients to understand their condition(s) and treatment plan(s) and provide resources and support to facilitate healthy lifestyle changes.
- Medication management: Virtual Care can help with medication management, ensuring patients adhere to their medications correctly, request refills when needed, and adjust treatment plans accordingly.
- Mental health services: Virtual Care can offer remote mental health services, such as counseling or behavioral health integration.
- Remote patient monitoring: Virtual Care can enable continuous remote patient monitoring for healthcare providers and their clinical staff to track patients’ vital signs and other health data remotely.
- Telemedicine visits: Virtual Care enables healthcare clinicians to conduct phone or video consultations with patients, delivering remote patient care for various medical conditions.
In conclusion, Virtual Care can provide a range of services to patients including delivering convenient and accessible patient care, leading to improved health outcomes and increased patient satisfaction.
People Also Ask Questions
What are the benefits of virtual care for providers?
Virtual Care can offer healthcare providers several benefits, including:
- Expanded reach: Virtual care can expand a provider’s reach by enabling them to attend to patients who may face challenges accessing in-person care due to mobility or geographic limitations.
- Additional patient engagement: Virtual care can enhance patient engagement by providing accessible and convenient care, leading to increased participation in care and improved health outcomes.
- Improved patient satisfaction: Virtual care can increase patient satisfaction by offering accessible and convenient care, minimizing wait times, and enhancing the overall patient experience.
- Improved work-life balance: Virtual care can offer providers greater flexibility in their work schedules, enabling them to work remotely or outside traditional clinic hours. Additionally, since virtual care allows the healthcare providers’ care team members to provide continuous care to patients outside of office visits it can allow these care team members to assist the provider in the care of the patient which can lift their workload and allow them to be more targeted in their patient care for times when patients need them the most.
- Increased efficiency: Virtual Care can increase efficiency by better targeting when patients need in-person visits. Virtual care enables providers to attend to more patients in a shorter amount of time, since virtual care decreases the amount of no-shows or patients running late which affect a providers productivity in a traditional in office care.
- Reduced costs: Virtual Care can result in cost savings related to in-person care, such as administrative, infrastructure costs and travel costs. Many times a provider can decrease their needed office space or share office space with another provider since less patients need to be seen in the office. Also, automating virtual care can decrease the number of front office and medical assistants needed to care for patients since less patients will be coming into the office.
What are the different types of virtual health?
There are many different types of virtual health, including:
- Digital health coaching: Digital health coaching utilizes technology to offer patients individualized health coaching and support, including wellness, nutrition, or fitness coaching.
- Mobile health (mHealth): mHealth utilizes mobile devices, including tablets and smartphones, to provide healthcare services and information to patients, which may include a medication management mobile app, health tracking mobile apps, and remote monitoring apps.
- Remote patient monitoring: Remote patient monitoring utilizes technology to monitor patients’ health conditions remotely, including blood pressure, heart rate, or glucose levels, and transmit that data to healthcare providers for assessment and intervention.
- Telemedicine: Telemedicine utilizes technology for video consultations with healthcare providers.
- Augmented reality (AR) and Virtual reality (VR): AR and VR technologies offer patients immersive experiences, including augmented reality simulations for medical education and training or virtual reality therapy for mental health conditions.
In conclusion, virtual health involves a broad range of services and technologies that provide healthcare services and support to patients in various settings.
What are the disadvantages of virtual healthcare?
The following are virtual healthcare disadvantages:
- Lack of personal connection: Virtual healthcare can be impersonal, as it lacks the opportunity to establish a personal connection and rapport that can be built through face-to-face care which can help drive patient adherence to a care plan to reach their desired goals.
- Limited access: Virtual healthcare services may limit access for some patients, particularly those in underserved or rural areas who do not have internet or the required technology.
- Limited physical examination: Virtual healthcare may not facilitate a comprehensive physical exam when needed to help a healthcare provider diagnose and treat certain medical conditions.
- Privacy and security concerns: Not all virtual healthcare may be secure causing a patients’ health information not to be confidential, especially if it involves transmitting such data over the internet. Therefore, it is important for a provider to carefully vet out the technology. The healthcare organization will need to have a business associate agreements signed with their technology partners.
- Technical difficulties: Virtual healthcare depends on technology, which may sometimes be difficult to use or unreliable, leading to technical problems or disruptions in the delivery of care.
