CoxHealth is taking health care out of the doctor’s office with the launch of electronic visits.
The health system rolled out its eVisits program about six weeks ago, allowing some patients who use CoxHealth’s online Patient Express portal to communicate with doctors via e-mail.
“We started with a pilot project … to be sure everything was functional with it and working and accepted by patients,” said CoxHealth Medical Director Kerry Randolph.
Randolph said 13 doctors at three clinics – Cox Family Medicine Associates and Steeplechase Family Physicians in Springfield and CoxHealth Center in Willard – are able to use Patient Express for eVisits when patients need help with minor or recurring symptoms that might not require a visit to the office.
The Patient Express portal allows patients to schedule appointments and refill prescriptions, providing doctors and patients with secure access to the patients’ medical records and test results.
With eVisits, a patient must answer a series of questions about symptoms and send them through the online portal the doctor, who reviews the message and the patients’ charts. The doctor will then decide whether the situation can be handled electronically or require an office visit.
Though some patients may be concerned about privacy when seeking care online, Randolph said Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act privacy rules already require high levels of encryption within CoxHealth’s information technology infrastructure. That’s also why the Patient Express portal is the key component to electronic communication with the system’s doctors.
“I think many patients think that they can communicate with their physician directly by e-mail,” Randolph said. “But because of the privacy (issues), obviously they shouldn’t do that.”
The eVisits were originally proposed by Jeff Bond, president and CEO of Cox HealthPlans, Randolph said, and it took two years to get the necessary infrastructure in place.
Cox HealthPlans is currently the only insurance provider that covers the eVisits, paying $20 of each $30 charge. While an in-person visit can cost anywhere from $60 to more than $100, Randolph said a patient who uses the portal but has to visit the office will only be charged for the physical visit.
CoxHealth plans to have eVisits available throughout the entire system by the end of June, Randolph said, and eventually, options may expand to include cellular phone applications that would allow patients with back pain or other chronic symptoms to request nurse callbacks via text message.
St. John’s Health System, a subsidiary of Sisters of Mercy Health System, implemented its own inpatient electronic record system in July, said St. John’s spokeswoman Cora Scott. Mercy and St. John’s are in Phase II of an electronic record pilot project that is built on a portal similar to CoxHealth’s Patient Express, she said. The pilot project also includes some electronic visits, though Scott said most of the pilot participants are in the St. Louis area.
She said St. John’s hopes to have it available to more southwest Missouri patients this summer.
“We’re still gathering information and learning about their experiences with it,” Scott said.
In the meantime, she said, patients do have some access to virtual care through videoconferencing.
“Because of telemedicine, we’re able to have a patient go to a primary care doctor in Rogers, Ark., and use video teleconferencing equipment to … virtually visit a neurosurgeon in Springfield, Mo.,” Scott said. “So for these people who live in smaller communities, they still have access … to very sub-specialized physicians. ... There are a lot of things on the horizon.”
Helping to facilitate transmission of those virtual encounters is Mercy’s new $60 million data center near St. Louis. According to previous Springfield Business Journal coverage, that center is designed to provide quicker transmissions as well as protection from environmental disasters and power outages.[[In-content Ad]]
