The impact of telehealth and telepharmacy technology on public health service pressure and patient outcomes.
Now Healthcare Group have produced a report quantifying the impact of digital technology on patient outcomes, medicine adherence and the reduction of pressure on public health services and private employers. The figures within are based on live Now Healthcare data combined with publicly available NHS and academic sources.
The headline findings are:
- Use of telehealth consultations obviated the need for an NHS GP appointment in 56% of cases and a hospital appointment in 3% of cases. Extrapolated across the population as a whole, adoption of the technology could potentially save public health services in England £7.5bn annually.
- Pre-triage through app technology could redirect up to 73% of patients to non-GP consultations (i.e. nurse or pharmacist), reducing pressure on primary care doctors. Successful implementation of such a programme could deliver additional annual savings of £2.2bn.
- Adoption of the technology amongst private employers has prevented 600 days of workplace absence (per 100,000 people), equivalent to an annual productivity benefit across the UK worth £240m in value.
- Usage of adherence technology improved the probability of patients sticking to their medication schedule by 41%.
- When patients were given direct control over repeat prescription ordering they only ordered 31% of total possible items, demonstrating the scope for the technology to reduce over-ordering waste.