A digital embrace to blunt the curve of COVID19 pandemic

Lee H Schwamm; Alistair Erskine; Adam Licurse

doi:10.1038/s41746-020-0279-6

A digital embrace to blunt the curve of COVID19 pandemic

NPJ Digit Med. 2020 May 4:3:64. doi: 10.1038/s41746-020-0279-6. eCollection 2020.

Authors

Lee H Schwamm^#^{1

2

3}, Alistair Erskine^#^{1

2}, Adam Licurse^#^{1

2

4}

Affiliations

¹ 1Harvard Medical School, Boston, USA.
² 2Partners Healthcare, Boston, USA.
³ 3Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, USA.
⁴ Brigham Health, Boston, USA.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Digital health, virtual care, telehealth, and telemedicine are all terms often used interchangeably to refer to the practice of care delivered from a distance. Because virtual care collapses the barriers of time and distance, it is ideal for providing care that is patient-centered, lower cost, more convenient and at greater productivity. All these factors make virtual care tools indispensable elements in the COVID19 response. In this perspective, we offer implementation guidance and policy insights relevant to the use of virtual care tools to meet the challenges of the COVID19 pandemic.

Keywords: Health care; Health policy.

Publication types

Review