"Pandemic fuels accelerated adoption of telemedicine in S.C.," Columbia Regional Business Report

Posted On July 27, 2020

In the July issue of Columbia Regional Business Report, Ryan Judd discusses how technology and healthcare have been accelerated exponentially due to the COVID-19 pandemic in South Carolina.

“The adoption of telemedicine, or telehealth –the delivery of healthcare from a distance by means of audio and visual technologies– has been a clear example of such a shift,” explains Judd. “While telehealth had been slowly making its way into medicine’s mainstream in recent years, during the early weeks of the coronavirus’s spread in March and April, its utilization as a percentage of all healthcare visits increased from essentially 0% to 15%.”

Many physicians in South Carolina have opened the door to telemedicine due to the remarkable circumstances of the COVID-19 outbreak, but much remains to be seen as to how the practice of telehealth will emerge on the other side as patients return to pre-pandemic comfort levels with in-person services.