What is the Difference between Telehealth and Telemedicine?
You may have heard of or used Telehealth. The growth of Telehealth has increased rapidly after the pandemic of COVID-19. Because during the pandemic of COVID-19, people depended on the Internet for their daily issues, and health was one of the issues faced daily by people. They needed a platform where they could get healthcare services. They found Telehealth, where they can get healthcare services from different experts at a distance with the help of the Internet.
Sometimes people use Telemedicine in place of Telehealth, or vice versa. Sometimes, they are confused between them. In this blog, we will discuss the difference between Telehealth vs Telemedicine. We will discuss them one by one. First, we will start with Telehealth.
Telehealth
Telehealth is a medium where people get their healthcare services at a distance, mainly through video conferencing. Apart from this, this medium is also used for sharing information related to health with patients, doctors, and medical students. It is a broader concept than Telemedicine. You will get all these services at your home or any comfortable place through telecommunications. Let’s understand Telehealth app with some examples.
Examples of Telehealth
The followings are some examples of Telehealth-
- To check their body’s blood pressure and cholesterol levels, patients use a mobile app.
- Patients can examine their lab results, schedule appointments, and obtain prescription medications through an online self-service portal like a patient portal.
- Patients can receive online reminders for vaccines, examinations, or prescription refills.
Let’s see some benefits of Telehealth.
Benefits of Telehealth
The following are some benefits of Telehealth-
1. Remote Health Monitoring
Checkups for preventative health are made easier by a novel method of health monitoring. It fills the gap between the actual healthcare facilities and the places where patients reside and work. Physicians can remotely communicate information with patients and track the healthy development of their patients with the aid of remote technologies. Few devices can immediately exchange patient data with doctors, including blood pressure, weight, and pulse rate. It enables the doctor to continuously monitor any abnormal deviation in the patient’s body and spot areas for improvement and minor issues before they turn into major issues.
2. Mobile Health
The person’s current health status is displayed on this platform using mobile apps. Its potential is open to both ill and healthy individuals. With the use of mobile devices like smartphones, tablets, and laptops/computers, mHealth enables patients and mobility disorder professionals to give healthcare and educational support materials. A dependable form of communication is provided by mobile health. It provides services irrespective of geographical limitations.
3. Cost effective
It reduces the overhead cost of patients, including traveling, food, staying, parking, etc. as well as reduces the maintenance cost of hospitals, including office decor, waiting room, the salary of staff, etc.
4. The Accessibility Of Rural Areas
It was always an issue for rural areas to get proper healthcare services. The people of rural areas have to travel far for better treatment. But now, people in rural areas get better treatment from their homes with the help of Telehealth.
Now it’s time for Telemedicine. Let’s see what Telemedicine is.
What is Telemedicine?
Telemedicine is a subset of Telehealth, which means it is a part of Telehealth. Telehealth and Telemedicine are approximately similar, but the only difference is that Telemedicine is limited to providing services to patients.
Telemedicine is a medium where Only people get healthcare services from a doctor at a distance through telecommunications. Apart from this service, no other services are provided by Telemedicine. Telemedicine apps emerged as the best choice during a recent pandemic crisis to make sure patients receive high-quality care remotely.
Benefits of Telemedicine
The following are some benefits of Telemedicine-
1. Virus Exposure is Lessened
If you get your treatment from Telemedicine, there is no need to go to the hospital or face to face interactions with doctors. You can get the treatment at your home that reduces the virus exposure.
2. Care during the night
Patients have 24/7 access to Telemedicine, which provides immediate medical care from distant locations.
3. Enhances doctor’s safety
No need for face to face interaction between doctors or patients for treatment in Telemedicine, which increases the doctor’s safety from any infection or viruses.
4. Assistance for Patients with Chronic Illnesses
Patients with chronic diseases find Telemedicine to be a handy choice since it allows them to avoid making in-person hospital visits.
5. Online Psychiatric Support
Medical professionals offer various advantages to patients in psychiatry. A couple of them include swift healing and individualized treatment.
Telehealth v/s Telemedicine
The following are some differences between Telehealth and Telemedicine-
1. Telehealth is a broad concept, where Telemedicine is a part of Telehealth.
2. Telehealth is not only restricted to providing healthcare services to patients. It also engages in providing information related to health to students, doctors, or patients. But, Telemedicine is restricted to providing only healthcare services to patients.
3. In Telehealth, the services are provided by healthcare experts, healthcare staff, pharmacists, medical professors, and Frontline workers. But, only healthcare professionals provide healthcare services in Telemedicine.
4. Education about healthcare, numerous lab test results, training, a partnership between technology and the healthcare industry, etc. are all included in Telehealth. But, Telemedicine provides healthcare services to patients only.
5. Patients with chronic conditions who use Telehealth can track their progress and communicate with their doctors to take part in their care. Whereas, Telemedicine only broadens the scope of physician coverage.
Conclusion
In this blog, we have discussed the differences between Telehealth and Telemedicine. After reading this blog, you will know that all the services of Telemedicine are Telehealth, but not all the services of Telehealth are Telemedicine. We hope that the blog will be useful for you.