Plans, providers say telemedicine improves diabetes management

From a California safety-net plan to Mississippi's sole academic medical center, payers and providers alike cite benefits from utilizing telemedicine as a strategy for diabetes care management. Here are two success stories;

1. Partnership HealthPlan, a Medi-Cal managed care plan covering 14 rural counties in northern California, is experiencing care improvements from its $265,800 investment in telemedicine efforts, says Robert Layne, Partnership's director of government and public affairs.  

Robert LaynePartnership aims to deliver high quality care to  its 530,000 members, whether it's done through the electronic exchange of medical information from one site to another or by other approaches, Layne says. Preliminary results show the telemedicine strategy is driving down ER visits among plan members with diabetes and other chronic illnesses, and wait-times for specialists are falling, he says.

Previously, a rural health center serving as a Partnership telehealth site had an eight-month backlog for endocrinology appointments, Layne notes. But the center, by holding two telehealth clinics a month, decreased the average wait-time to nine days for such appointments.

Telemedicine “gives members the opportunity to see a specialist sooner and closer to home,” he says. “Members who may have otherwise foregone medical services due to lack of specialists in their area and or a lack of financial resources now have another option...”

2. Since the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMMC) began leading the Diabetes Telehealth Network in August 2014, none of the first 100 patients enrolled in the pilot has had to go to the emergency room or hospital for diabetes care, says Kristi Henderson, DNP, the medical center's chief telehealth and innovation officer. Previously, many had visited the ER or hospital several times annually.

Kristi Henderson“We've had an average decrease of 1.7% in A1C [blood glucose testing], and a 96% compliance rate for medications,” compared to a national average of around 60%, Henderson says, explaining that the diabetes telehealth pilot launched in one medically underserved county in the Mississippi Delta with a soaring rate of diabetes. “And we found 11 cases of retinopathy that needed ophthalmic intervention.”

In fact, the telediabetes program-with remote monitoring in the home for patients given tablets to record data-is improving outcomes and saving money to such an extent that UMMC and its partners, including the state and technology vendors, decided to roll the program out statewide before the pilot has finished enrollment. (Out of targeted enrollment of 200, 127 people with diabetes were signed up as of July 12.)

UMMC's broader telehealth effort involves 35 medical specialties at 176 telehealth locations around Mississippi, including health departments, schools and businesses, Henderson says. The system handles 100,000-some patient visits annually.

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