https://mailchi.mp/45f15de483b9/the-weekly-gist-october-9-2020?e=d1e747d2d8

While telemedicine visits have decreased sharply since their early pandemic peak, we’re hearing from providers across the country that patient demand for email communication has persisted. 

Many patients have missed meaningful in-person interactions with their doctors. But once they sign up for the portal and realize they can email, they don’t want to go back to spending time on hold or scheduling a visit to get a prescription refill or the answer to a simple question.

Email and messaging saves patients a lot of time, but the sheer amount has quickly become unmanageable for many doctors. “Last year I got half a dozen emails per week from patients,” one primary care physician told us. “Now I’m spending two hours a day answering MyChart messages, and I’m still not keeping up.”

And as many are quick to point out, there is little to no compensation for time spent emailing. Health systems and physician practices can’t “roll back” this service—removing this satisfier would expose them to losing patients altogether. 

In the near term, systems must invest in the staff and infrastructure to create a centralized process to triage messages. And longer-term, they must align physician compensation and payment models away from visit-based economics and toward comprehensive patient communication and management.