Juan Andino Breaks Down Interstate Telehealth Waivers

<p><a href="https://www.healthaffairs.org/membership?utm_medium=podcast&amp;utm_source=insider">Join Health Affairs Insider</a>.</p><br><p>Telemedicine burst onto the scene as the nation locked down at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Historically, telehealth, or telemedicine, was tightly restricted both by regulation and by payment policy.</p><p><br></p><p>But in response to COVID-19's disruption of in-person care, all 50 states and Washington, DC issued temporary waivers that allowed clinicians to administer telehealth care to patients who live in a different state than their provider.</p><p><br></p><p>Juan Andino from the <a href="https://umich.edu/">University of Michigan</a> joins <em>A Health Podyssey</em> to discuss how interstate telehealth use changed in the face of COVID-19.</p><p><br></p><p>Andino and colleagues published a paper in the <a href="https://www.healthaffairs.org/toc/hlthaff/41/6?utm_medium=podcast&amp;utm_source=a+health+podyssey&amp;utm_term=TOC">June 2022 issue</a> of <em>Health Affairs</em> <a href="https://www.healthaffairs.org/doi/full/10.1377/hlthaff.2021.01825?utm_medium=podcast&amp;utm_source=a+health+podyssey&amp;utm_term=andino">assessing the effect of waivers on interstate telehealth use among Medicare beneficiaries</a> during the COVID-19 pandemic.</p><p><br></p><p>They found that while the volume of interstate telehealth use increased in 2020, out of state telehealth use continued to make up only a small share of all outpatient visits and all telehealth visits. They also found some interesting patterns on  how interstate telehealth has changed.</p><p><a href="https://www.pubservice.com/backissue/subbi.aspx?CO=PJ&amp;PC=HR&amp;BI=HRI&amp;utm_medium=podcast&amp;utm_source=a+health+podyssey&amp;utm_campaign=44682&amp;utm_content=44682&amp;utm_term=andino">Order the June 2022 issue of <em>Health Affairs</em> for research on costs, care delivery, COVID-19, and more</a>.</p><p>C<em>urrently, more than 70 percent of our content is freely available — and we’d like to keep