In the early months of the pandemic, the explosive use of virtual care dropped sharply across all professions, but only one — mental health. In fact, telehealth usage among mental health patients is continuing to climb, according to a new study. Report.
For reporting, medical appointment platform ZokdocUsed by millions of patients every month, it checked appointments booked on its platform from May 2020 to May 2022. In May 2020, one-third of appointments were for telehealth visits, a year later that had dropped to 17%. Excluding mental health, only 9% of appointments last month were made virtually.
By contrast, when examining telehealth for mental health appointments, the numbers tell a different story. In May 2020, 74% of mental health appointments booked on Zocdoc were virtual. It rises to 85% in May 2021 and 87% in May 2022.
Zocdoc chief commercial officer Richard Fine said virtual mental health visits will continue to grow. While every other profession has shifted to in-person care, mental health is shifting more towards telehealth, he said.
“The conversational nature of mental health appointments — and the discretion, ease and efficiency of talking to a therapist at home without commuting — means telehealth may remain the first choice for patients’ mental health care,” he said.
Respondents to a Zocdoc survey on patient attitudes towards virtual visits said they prefer telehealth to in-person mental health care because it is more convenient and saves them more time and money. Not having to commute to in-person visits often means patients don’t have to pay for transportation or take time off work.
The convenience telemedicine offers to those seeking mental health care comes at a critical time.Forty percent of American adults reporting Anxiety and Depression Symptoms, and Providers reporting There was a 93% increase in patients seeking resources for anxiety. Because telehealth appointments often allow patients to see a provider sooner than they would seek in-person care, the urgent need for mental health care is another reason the profession is utilizing telehealth more than other professions.
The report also showed that relaxing Covid-19 protocols and returning to in-person settings did not affect mental health patients seeking in-person care. Of patients who book a virtual mental health visit with a new provider, less than 5% book a follow-up in-person appointment. This compares to between 50 and 60 for patients who book a telehealth visit with a new OB-GYN, ophthalmologist or dentist.
Mental health telehealth craze aside, virtual care in all other specialties has been a flop since the first few months of the pandemic, but still accounted for significantly more visits than before Covid-19. According to Fine, in February 2020, less than 1% of Zocdoc’s bookings were for telehealth.
Patients will avoid Covid-19 and follow infection control protocols as their main reasons for seeking telehealth care during the first few months of the pandemic.77% of American adults now vaccinated And with most pandemic protocols relaxed, providers and patients now see the widespread use of telehealth in all modalities as “a supplement to personal care, not a replacement for it,” Fine said.
Seventy-seven percent of patients surveyed by Zocdoc believe they will use a combination of telehealth and in-person care in the future, and 83 percent of providers survived saying that future healthcare will involve a mix of these care modalities.
Image Credit: Olga Strelnikova, Getty Images
