Telehealth has grown from a promising innovation to become essential during the COVID-19 pandemic. A new data note explores the use of telehealth by community health centers, and outlines the substantial barriers to telehealth adoption related to reimbursement, up-front investment, and staffing. While telehealth has the potential to substantially improve access to care in medically underserved rural and urban communities in both the near and long term, these barriers must be addressed in order for its potential to be realized. Health centers will be an important bellwether of progress as telehealth policy and implementation unfold.
The data note was authored by Rebecca Morris, James Hernandez, Sara Rosenbaum, Feygele Jacobs, Peter Shin and Jessica Sharac.