Telehealth Post-Pandemic: A Roadmap for the Coming Decade

The availability of telehealth services experienced unprecedented growth during the COVID-19 pandemic. Because of the public health emergency and the need to implement virtual care quickly, little consideration was given to how to sustain these services once the pandemic ended. This left a gap in policies and sustainability strategies for this important facet of care, including a lack of evidence-based best practices, telemedicine training curriculums, and policies around reimbursement and licensure requirements.

This grant will fund a conference in a Think Tank format bringing together a multidisciplinary group of decision leaders from health systems, physician groups, researchers, patient advocates, technology groups, insurers, and policymakers in Michigan. The group will develop recommendations for priorities and policies for health systems, insurers, and policymakers, to guide evidence-based practices for providing high-quality and equitable telehealth services. The group will work closely with regional stakeholders to facilitate the transferability of conference products to other States and regions. Following the conference, the guidance developed will be disseminated nationally.

The specific aims of the research are as follows:

• Develop practice, policy, and research priorities to guide evidence-based approaches for providing telehealth services.
• Actively distribute these priorities to a national audience.

Prior to the Think Tank conference, the research team will develop a website; identify key topics via a literature review; identify key decisionmakers for conference participation; and form workgroups to identify research issues, barriers, and gaps. During the meeting, attendees will develop research and policy agendas and consider dissemination strategies for evidence- based telehealth practices. Conference deliverables will include the completed literature review, the website with blogs and podcasts, publications in Telemedicine and e-Health, policy briefs, and a telehealth curriculum. Following the meeting, findings and recommendations will be disseminated via presentations at national conferences, social media, and postings on the website.

The outputs of the Think Tank will directly inform policymakers’ and stakeholders’ decisions for improving telehealth and providing better access to healthcare for all Michigan residents, and provide a roadmap for other States for improving telehealth delivery.