New Texas Telehealth Institute Aims to Boost Rural Healthcare Access

September 25, 2023 - The Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center (TTUHSC) is establishing an institute focused on expanding and enhancing healthcare delivery through digital technologies.

The TTUHSC Institute of Telehealth and Digital Innovation aims to support rural healthcare access through a hub-and-spoke model operating via hubs established at TTUHSC's campuses. From these hubs, the institute will extend healthcare services in rural areas using telehealth and working with local entities to utilize existing community resources.

"The Institute of Telehealth and Digital Innovation is building a digital health ecosystem that engages people, processes and technologies such as AI, the internet of things and blockchain technology to transform delivery of health care in West Texas and eventually around the world," said John Gachago, DHA, executive director of the institute, in a press release. "The ultimate goal is to make predictive, precision, preventive and participatory care a reality for West Texans."

Further, the institute aims to spur collaboration between healthcare organizations in the region to expand specialty care access and chronic disease management services, support research to examine the clinical efficacy and outcomes associated with telehealth, and train the healthcare workforce in digital healthcare.

"We're moving towards a technology-enhanced ecosystem in health care," said TTUHSC President Lori Rice-Spearman, PhD, at the ribbon-cutting ceremony on Sept. 19. "And so, it's important that we understand how we can use these tools to help individuals be advocates for their own care."

Telehealth is not new to TTUHSC, with virtual care services launching in 1989 to connect the university's four original campuses in Lubbock, Amarillo, Odessa, and El Paso, the press release noted. The services were expanded in 1990, connecting the Lubbock campus to rural sites for teleconsultations.

Today, the concept of digital health has grown to include a wide array of services and technologies beyond teleconsultations, such as mobile applications, remote patient monitoring, the cloud, and artificial intelligence, Gachago said in the press release.

TTUHSC is the latest healthcare provider organization to launch an institute dedicated to virtual care.

Last year, Sanford Health broke ground on a 60,000-square-foot virtual care center, which will offer various types of care through telehealth, including services related to urgent care, behavioral healthcare, and primary care. The center also plans to establish five pilot satellite clinics in rural areas where healthcare services are tough to access. The center is slated to open in 2024.

Similarly, UVA Health and a Southwest Virginia-based coalition of healthcare groups partnered in February to enhance virtual healthcare access and improve outcomes for COVID-19 and chronic disease patients in the state.

The consortium includes the UVA Center for Telehealth, the Healthy Appalachia Institute at the University of Virginia's College at Wise, and Ballad Health, among others. Their goal is to expand access to telehealth and in-home monitoring services through tablets, blood pressure cuffs, thermometers, and scales.

The organizations also plan to expand two state-funded regional programs focusing on virtual mental healthcare and chronic disease prevention and management services and extend UVA Health's Project ECHO, which offers provider education on COVID-19 and post-COVID care and access to virtual consults with UVA specialists.

There is also a growing interest in assessing telehealth's value and ensuring equitable access to virtual care.

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill launched the Center for Virtual Care Value and Equity (ViVE) on August 1 to conduct translational research on telehealth equity.

"The hypothesis that telehealth was going to solve a lot of our problems, especially in underserved and rural areas, although it was somewhat successful, one major lesson that we learned was that a substantial number or amount of people was left behind," said Saif Khairat, PhD, associate professor, and Beerstecher-Blackwell Distinguished Term Scholar in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill School of Nursing, in an interview with mHealthIntelligence.

The center aims to develop actionable tools and frameworks that organizations can use to implement equitable and sustainable virtual care programs.