Push to reduce ED visits leads patients to urgent care, retail clinics — not telehealth

Becker's Healthcare September 5, 2018
Julie Spitzer

As payers increasingly turn to alternate modes of care delivery as a way to keep patients with low-acuity conditions out of expensive emergency departments, recent evidence suggests that urgent care centers and retail clinics — not telehealth — appear to be patients’ go-to options, a JAMA Internal Medicineinvestigation has found.

A team of researchers led by Sabrina Poon, MD, a physician in the department of emergency medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, reviewed a set of deidentified claims data from Aetna between Jan. 1, 2008, and Dec. 31, 2015. The cohort included about 20 million insured members per study year.

Here are six study highlights:

1. Visits to the ED for low-acuity conditions decreased 36 percent during the...

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