Telemedicine....lower caost of Medicine. Making care easier for everyone.

'bout time! Not only does telemedicine help patients, but it also lowers cost. Also...there an increase in the physicians quality of life (Can see patients from home)!

 

Big telehealth firm to go public as remote doctor visits gain traction

Jayne O'Donnell and Benjamin F Mitchell, USA TODAY10:55 p.m. EDT June 30, 2015

One of the largest companies in the telemedicine field is going public Wednesday in a move that signals how important remote doctor visits are becoming to the future of health care and efforts to reduce costs.

Shares in Teladoc, a growing but sometimes controversial player in the field, are priced at $19. Teladoc expects to raise gross proceeds of $180 million by selling 9.5 million shares, which includes 15% made available to the underwriters.

The expected proceeds exceed earlier estimates of about $130 million. Teladoc raised the share price from an estimated $15-17 and added more shares due to the positive reception during the investor road show.

"There was very strong reception by the investment community to the market opportunity, Teladoc's leadership position, our historical performance and our future opportunity," CEO Jason Gorevic told USA TODAY late Tuesday.

Teladoc's 700 board-certified doctors deal directly with consumers on the phone, which sets the company apart from much of the rest of telemedicine, which more often involves a physician with a sick patient who video conferences with another doctor who is often a specialist.

The company won a legal fight recently when a federal judge ruled that a Texas Medical Board regulation that prohibited doctors from diagnosing patients over the phone who they hadn't seen in person or on video was probably anti-competitive. The board was blocked from enforcing it until an antitrust suit Teladoc filed against the board was decided.

Teladoc started in 2002, and Gorevic, a former president of Empire Blue Cross Blue Shield, joined as CEO in 2009.

"I've been looking throughout my career for an opportunity to do something that could really improve quality of care, reduce the cost of care and was a win, win, win for the payers, whether the employers or the health plans, the consumer and the doctor and I finally found one," Gorevic says.

Even the telemedicine industry is conflicted about the best way to do this. Industry experts at an American Telemedicine Association conference in May debated the risks and benefits of over-the-phone consultations, saying that although it is possible to effectively and ethically treat mild conditions this way, some illnesses can't be safely treated over the phone or in a video call. Panelists noted 10% of prescriptions for pediatric sinus infections occur over the phone, and it's up to the industry to keep that number from growing since these children should be seen in person.

A RAND Corp. study commissioned by the California Healthcare Foundation found Teladoc physicians prescribed antibiotics at the same rate as doctors did during office visits.

Several studies show video is "by far preferred as the primary medium in telemedicine," says medical technology analyst Roeen Roashan.

"There is a comfort and level of intimacy that allows both physician and patient to end the session satisfied," he says. But phone consultations have "existed for many years and still play a big role today."

Though some mainstream family care doctors bristle at what they see as a risky practice, companies including PepsiCo, Bank of America and some major insurers use Teladoc as a way to cut soaring health care costs and make doctors more accessible. About 11 million of their employees and clients are Teladoc members.

Another Teladoc client, Rent-a-Center, saves an average of $754 per employee every time they do a phone consultation with a doctor, according to a Teladoc-commissioned study co-authored by Harvard Medical School associate professor and physician Niteesh Choudhry and Stanford School of Medicine professor and physician Arnold Milstein.

The biggest savings reflect what it would have cost if employees went to the emergency room instead. The authors acknowledge something Roashan points out: The savings from telephone consultations are partially offset by the number of times patients need in-office visits after the calls.

Gorevic boasts that his company does more than 500,000 of the 800,000 phone and video consultations a year that involve just one doctor and a patient. That's dwarfed by the 10 million video consultations a year that involve doctors consulting with each other about a patient, which Roashan says could double by 2018.

He's not convinced that's a good thing.

"A 15-minute video call is not the same as good health care," says Roashan, who is with IHS Technology. "There's no patient engagement, it's just a transaction."

Gorevic says his doctors offer patients the option of talking via Facetime or sending pictures or videos for doctors to see. All patients fill out medical histories before they are seen, which is typically within 10 minutes.

Teladoc was sued in early June by competitor American Well, which alleged Teladoc's technology infringed on an American Well patent. The suit seeks an injunction against Teladoc continuing to do business. Teladoc petitioned the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office in March to invalidate some of American Well's patents. Both cases are pending.

"The investment community recognizes Teladoc's opportunity to change the health care landscape," Gorevic says.