Nursing is always evolving, as is healthcare in general. Much of this is thanks to huge progress in medicine and treatment standards. However, over the past few years, we have all seen broad leaps in the technology we use.
One of the biggest leaps forward, both in terms of convenience and necessity, has been the emergence of telehealth. As a result of needs that arose for healthcare and nursing at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, patients couldn’t access the physical support they required.Â
Therefore, telehealth ensured people could still gain advice and support on medication, health symptoms, and general concerns. Despite the world having adapted to COVID-19 in the main, telehealth remains a positive force for change within nursing and healthcare policy.
Let’s explore what telehealth is, how it could benefit nurses and patients, and what challenges are available for healthcare bodies to overcome.
What is telehealth?
Telehealth refers to healthcare support provided to patients and people in need through technology. Most specifically, it refers to apps, programs, and services where people can access doctor and nurse advice through video calls, instant messaging, and other remote media.
The major benefit of telehealth overall is that it provides diagnostic support and advice to patients without needing them to be physically available in a nurse’s office or hospital. This was a result of the social distancing guidelines that reduced patient numbers in clinics at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Telehealth, however, had been around long before the pandemic began, and it will endure for many years afterward. Telehealth does more than simply allow patients to speak with nurses and doctors from afar. In some cases, using hardware supplied by hospitals and clinics, nurses can monitor certain patient vitals without patients needing to attend a clinic at all.
There are huge benefits obvious for all parties involved – and, given that these options became more mainstream at the height of the pandemic, many healthcare bodies are considering how such technology can support their policies moving forward.
What are the potential benefits of telehealth for nursing in the long run?
Ultimately, nursing policy will still stand as-is. However, telehealth has measurable benefits for the running of patient care as well as for boosting positive outcomes.
Nursing students taking online bridge programs, such as those offered by Wilkes University, might find telehealth starting to emerge as a burning topic on various modules. In fact, as a forward-thinking college, Wilkes University is committed to changing its output to mirror the needs of nurses and patients in an ever-changing landscape.
Let’s look at a few of the major benefits nurses and patients can expect from telehealth and how they might alter policy for good.
Nurses can attend to a wider range of people
The immediate benefit we can all see from telehealth is that it will ensure nurses treat more people more often. This means reaching out to communities that might struggle with access to physical healthcare support.
The eventual goal here is that telehealth will boost positive patient outcomes and that there will be fewer admissions into accident and emergency centers due to care not being provided sooner. What hospital and nursing policy will need to adjust to, however, is heavier workloads for medical professionals.
Hospitals leaning into telehealth will not only take on more patient cases but will also expect more cases worked by their nurses. That means clinics need to make room for virtual and physical care demands. This requires smarter timetabling and organization to ensure nurses can help both types.
Nurses can provide real-time data to doctors and other specialists
While nurses might take on more patients, the time spent on diagnosing and treating patients is likely to decrease through a focus on telehealth. This is largely because telehealth apps and programs help specialists to share data and insight between doctors, specialists, and other departments faster than ever before.
For example, details from a diagnostic or fact-finding appointment with a patient might be shared directly with another specialist’s user profile using a specific app. Rather than waiting for information to transfer manually, nurses can provide other healthcare professionals with real-time details for quick action.
This could help to cut down waiting times and resource demand for hospitals and other clinics. Therefore, policies must adjust to make room for data-sharing and how that impacts the patients’ privacy. Using telehealth in such a way will demand patients to sign and agree to the way their cases progress via certain apps.
Remote measurement technology is on the rise
One of telehealth’s most pioneering changes to nursing in the past few years is its connectivity with different hardware and analytics services. For example, instead of expecting a patient to head into a clinic to provide blood pressure and heart rate readings, nurses could simply ask their patients to use the hardware provided and check at home.
The patients in question measure themselves using this hardware, and information uploads directly onto an app that a nurse also tracks. It’s much like tracking these vitals in-clinic, but it’s more convenient and efficient.
This side of telehealth has already transformed how quickly patients receive care and how quickly they discharge. However, hospital and nursing policies will need to account for additional funding to provide hardware to patients and will need to account for any potential anomalies that arise.
Hospitals and nursing staff must also address how to deliver hardware to patients. Will it be available on a rental basis, or will each patient have access to their own unique tools and technology?
The costs involved are likely to raise immediate questions, but the costs saved in handling patient cases faster will likely balance out such new demands.
People can receive nursing treatment when physically restricted
Telehealth has the potential to provide treatment to patients who would otherwise lose out as a result of mobility and accessibility issues. For example, patients who are terminally ill at home, require home care, or are physically unable to attend hospitals or clinics can use telehealth to check in regularly with nursing staff.
Therefore, hospitals can save lives by providing telehealth access to wider communities. Meanwhile, those who may be extremely ill and unable to attend clinics benefit from convenient and comfortable support without having to leave their surroundings physically.
The changes to policy here, again, will need to account for increasing patient numbers and will also need to establish how remote patients are measured and addressed. Ultimately, all patients still need to receive the same standards of care as in a hospital, with the exception of access to medication, IVs, etc.
Restricted patients can expect a greater lease of life and even more efficient care provision through remote nursing.Â
It’s easy to access records through connected apps and services
As discussed above, telehealth makes it simple for nurses to diagnose and advise patients remotely and to provide details discussed to other parties in real-time.
Telehealth apps and services will also help to share data and patient records without extensive searching or the risk of losing physical information. Telehealth can keep all relevant data together in one place, meaning specialists in different clinical areas can access the same details through one app.
This is immensely convenient for nurses and other professionals, and patients benefit as their caregivers can provide support faster and with greater accuracy.
Hospital policies must account for how data is shared and stored on-site and in the cloud where appropriate. Again, this likely means patients must agree to certain data storage and usage policies before using such apps and services.
What challenges do nurses face with telehealth?
As the healthcare world moves steadily toward telehealth, adopting and rolling out services across different hospitals and clinics will still face some challenges. With the angle of positive change ahead, let’s consider what some of those challenges look like.
Training challenges
One of the biggest adjustments nurses and healthcare bodies need to adjust for with telehealth is training. As with all technological aids, staff will need to get accustomed to specific systems and services to provide the care patients expect.
However, it’s the responsibility of hospitals and administrators to map out how this occurs. Will all nurses in a specific hospital use one or two apps? Will specialists and doctors have access to the same platforms, or will they have other programs? Can everyone access the same services and see the same data?
Training nurses on telehealth isn’t likely to be a time-consuming problem. However, ensuring all healthcare staff access the same systems and training standards will take careful planning and provision.
Nurses will likely need to pursue their own training and acclimate to telehealth software. As many nurses learn as they work, this is unlikely to be a major concern for most. However, student nurses graduating from degrees and other programs must keep an open mind when adapting to new systems and services.
Discussion of sensitive topics
For many nurses and patients, discussing sensitive and potentially-distressing news is an in-person scenario. While speaking via video call and visual communication is more personable than discussing problems via email or instant message, there will likely still be some people who prefer to speak to nurses and doctors in person.
For example, some patients undergoing intensive care plans or experiencing painful, chronic conditions may prefer emotional support in person. Every patient and their needs will differ, meaning hospitals and nursing teams need to keep options open and accessible.
It’s wise for hospital administrators to plan for half-telehealth, half-traditional care. In some cases, traditional, in-person treatment will be unavoidable. When it comes to preference, however, offering a choice between telehealth and physical discussion is preferable.
Not all nurses prefer to discuss sensitive cases and issues via video call or telehealth. In this case, specialists will need to raise concerns with their supervisors – and, at the same time, administrators need to be flexible around the needs of their nurses just as much as their patients.
Physical testing is difficult
The remote hardware data tracking that telehealth provides is nothing short of revolutionary. However, that doesn’t make it completely infallible. As mentioned, there may be cases where hospitals and administrators need to decide whether to loan out equipment.
For nurses, too, reading data from remote hardware isn’t always as easy a task as it might appear. Training will be required, and some nurses, again, prefer traditional methods. Care providers therefore need to research the telehealth market carefully to find a scalable and sustainable system for the clinics they run.Â
Physical testing on a remote basis is also still in its infancy. That means there are still issues to overcome and tests to perform. As such, care organizations will do well to balance telehealth and in-clinic measurements while they get up to speed and wait for technology to gradually improve.
Is telehealth a force for good?
Telehealth is certainly a positive trailblazer, however, it’s set to challenge more traditional clinical and nursing practices as the years go by. While many hospitals and clinics already use telehealth tools as standard, many are still yet to embrace the hardware and software available. However, nurses who keep open minds regarding the different tools and services available to them will be sure to thrive in the workplace.
Overall, we are living and working in an exciting time for care provision. Telehealth will ensure more people than ever before have access to the support they need when they need it.
