Five disruptive telehealth startups to watch highlighting how telehealth is changing the face of healthcare delivery and the innovative startups behind it.
Haven’t heard the rumblings of the telehealth movement yet? Chances are, you will. Telehealth and its technologies are set to change the face of healthcare delivery as we know it, both in the US and abroad. It’s a bold declaration but not an inaccurate one to make.
When it comes to meeting today’s healthcare challenges, telehealth holds a great deal of promise, as pointed out by Nirav Desai, CEO of Hands on Telehealth, in his guest post last month. Telehealth is placing proactive, preventative, and curative tools into the hands of medical providers via telecommunication platforms and mobile devices—with the potential to create greater access to care while cutting the costs to deliver it. But is telehealth worthy of early adoption, as Desai suggested?
With care demands on the rise, and the supply to meet them dwindling, telehealth may just be the umbrella needed to weather what Desai described as the perfect storm. Soon, the aging baby boomer population will lower its boom on the US healthcare system, taxing its resources in unprecedented numbers. According to the US Census Bureau, the senior population will comprise 55 million Americans (ages 65+) in the year 2020; it’s projected that 12 million will require long term care by then.
Seeking solutions to soften that impending blow now may not be such a bad idea after all. Still, telehealth and its potential go beyond assisting the elderly. From reaching out and serving the underserved to putting tools in the hands of patients themselves, telehealth startups are quickly emerging to disrupt, and perhaps later dominate, the market.