The Future of Telehealth: How to Offer Outstanding Virtual Care with RxPortal

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the aesthetic care industry has seen a surge in people seeking telehealth services. 

As a medical spa owner, you probably already know how telehealth can help your practice. You’ve seen the benefits for your patients and practice — more time for in-person visits, better access to consultations, reduced no-show rates, and happier patients.

At first, telehealth was a way for providers to hold virtual appointments on an ad hoc basis during the pandemic. For a number of reasons like convenience, safety, and cost — patients and providers alike enjoyed virtual care. 

As the benefits become apparent, practices that once dismissed telehealth as a temporary fix are starting to realize it’s here to stay.

What Is Telehealth?

Telehealth refers to any type of care delivered remotely via electronic communications between patients and providers or clinicians. 

Most telehealth solutions make it possible for patients to receive services from providers who may not be located within close proximity. Virtual care can also benefit your practice by providing you with opportunities for continuing education and professional development.

What Is Virtual Care?

Virtual care encompasses telemedicine and other remote healthcare technologies like home monitoring devices, mobile apps, and email communication between your practice and your patient.

Maximizing Telehealth and Virtual Care at Your Practice

Even as the COVID-19 pandemic recedes, many patients will continue to prefer virtual care or telehealth.

Telehealth offers a convenient, safe way for patients to receive care from anywhere with an internet connection. This access can be especially helpful for patients who live in rural areas and have difficulty traveling to healthcare providers. 

In addition, some people may feel more comfortable receiving treatment from their own home instead of in a medical office or hospital. By implementing telehealth and virtual care, your practice can attract more patients and encourage return visits by offering a convenient alternative to in-person visits. 

Explain the Virtual Care Process from Start to Finish

Because telehealth is still new, many individuals will be unfamiliar with the process as they attend their first appointment. They may have questions about how you’ll share your notes about the visit and how they will communicate effectively. 

Before each person’s first virtual care appointment, discuss every step of the process, so they feel more comfortable with the experience. Make sure your patient is on the same page with you at all times, and clarify your next steps as you navigate your meeting together. 

Offer a Paperless Experience

Medspas can offer a paperless experience with virtual consultations. For example, you can use an e-signature platform to send waivers, treatment plans, and other documents. Then, a patient can sign and submit them electronically. It’s more convenient than having patients come in to sign paperwork and speeds up the consultation process.

Eliminate the need for patients to fill out lengthy forms or sign multiple documents by replacing them with online registration forms and make it easy for patients to pay online without having to visit a front desk or waiting room.

If you have a HIPAA-compliant messaging service like RxPortal, your staff can text patients updates on their treatment plan or schedule changes after the consultation.

Let Your Patients Play an Active Role

With virtual care and telemedicine technology in aesthetic medicine practices, patients can take an active role in their treatment from the comfort of their own homes. 

The right tools empower your patients to receive personalized care when it’s best for them, whether that be day or night. Telehealth technology also provides your patients with a more affordable way to receive follow-up care after surgery or an in-office visit.

Medspas are uniquely positioned to embrace new technologies that make it easier for patients to engage with their providers and take an active role in their own care. 

Messaging capabilities in platforms like RxPortal allow you to send questions and reminders directly to a patient’s smartphone. Secure, encrypted messaging is HIPAA compliant and allows you to communicate with patients outside of office hours — use it for follow-up questions after procedures or for post-treatment check-ins.

Automate Reminders and Keep Patients in the Loop

By automating your appointment reminders, you can help your patients remember when they are scheduled to meet with you while minimizing the workload on your staff. 

Missed reminders mean missed appointments. By keeping your patients updated with regular reminders about your virtual meetings, you can help them show up on time more frequently and leverage the power of telehealth to its full potential. 

Offer Friendly, Remote Consultations

Remote consultations help you stay connected to your patients and keep them engaged with your practice. A remote consultation can be the perfect way to set a potential patient’s expectations and help them feel comfortable coming back for future appointments at your place of practice. 

Frequently, remote consultations are perfect for those looking to learn more about their options without leaving the comfort of their home. You can also use them to evaluate customer satisfaction after a service or help them schedule their next appointment. 

These consultations are easy to conduct and can be a great way to help people get familiar with your practice before ever stepping foot inside your doors.

Accelerate Your Virtual Care with RxPortal

Telehealth is increasingly the norm, not the exception. While the value of telehealth has been demonstrated in recent months, the limitations of standalone solutions are becoming more apparent.

Patients love telehealth because it’s convenient, but they also want to be able to physically see their provider if needed. Providers prefer a unified solution that doesn’t require switching back and forth between multiple platforms.

RxPortal is a virtual care platform from PatientNow that enables providers to offer telehealth services quickly and easily, without any additional setup or configuration. 

Our RxPortal solution blends seamlessly with the entire PatientNow platform, so notes from virtual visits and all correspondence with patients are securely stored and accessible from the patient record.

You can send telehealth-style survey invitations or provider-initiated follow-up requests to individual patients or groups from within PatientNow, and you can also conduct a live video visit or a secure messaging session with a patient directly from their PatientNow chart.

The software also lets you include virtual visits as part of your specialty-specific protocols for post-op visits or chronic disease management or integrate RxPortal into your existing website by adding an embedded widget for online booking of virtual appointments.

Learn more about RxPortal by speaking with our experts or requesting a demo to experience our innovative PatientNow platform firsthand.