Uncategorized
Providing Students with Telehealth Services
EIIA has partnered with TimelyMD to offer comprehensive student telehealth services to EIIA eligible institutions.
TimelyMD is a company solely focused on keeping the higher education population healthy by providing 24/7 quality medical care and counseling services.
The goal of the three-tiered program is to provide easy access telehealth services:
- Medical – 24/7 on-demand medical visits with licensed healthcare providers
- Talk Now – Unlimited 24/7 on-demand triage mental health support, including crisis management through licensed behavioral health professionals
- Scheduled Counseling – Access to licensed counselors, where students may pick a day and time for a visit. Each student is allowed up to (12) virtual visits annually.
Each plan is designed and directed by the institution to complement the services provided by the Health and Counseling Center.
TimelyMD provides:
- Medical providers specifically trained for students
- Clinical workflow protocols – the institution directs the referral process by the medical providers
- Granular utilization reporting
- Secured sharing of patient health records
- Diverse medical provider options for students to select from
- Marketing kit and on-campus kick off for a successful implementation
The Value of Telehealth Services During Budget Constraints:
Why do you believe telehealth for students still has value even with budgets getting tighter in higher ed?
“I am currently doing interim CFO work for a school in the south, and that very question came up in a recent board meeting. Here is my response.
In today’s culture of budget revisions in anticipation of a possible fall class missing its enrollment/retention targets, we enter a new era of limited resources being deployed in the best possible ways. Business is not ‘as usual’. With a 15% cut looming, or more, at any institution, how best can a college/university deploy less resources in the most productive manner?
For example, perhaps the funding of 50 students traveling to an international location for an immersed cultural experience is not as valuable right now as protecting their health from this virus. That $100,000 funding cut from the trips is easy to make, but can we deploy $80,000 on some health initiative? With the CARES Act and such funding for specific elements of healthcare on campus, can we do better? As CFO, first and foremost, we need to create a campus culture which is safe and trusted from this health pandemic. Testing, social spacing, enhanced cleaning of common spaces, and every other manner of outbreak containment we will do. Yet, is this enough?
What can we do to convince our students and their parents that they can trust the health safety of our environment and residential experience? Can we do something that builds this trust? Can we do something to give us some kind of a competitive edge to help mitigate any loss of enrollment or retention? Yes, we can. We can reimagine a health program on campus to be comprehensive. One that turns up the day-to-day cleaning operations, social distances in every classroom and open space on campus, adds new policies for interaction, and above all includes routine testing of all students, faculty and staff with quarantine facilities reserved for at-risk students.
Coupled with 24/7 access to medical and mental health professionals, we have a really good ‘reimagined’ and affordable health plan.”
Rick Gaumer
Founder & Principal, Academic Innovators
Interim VP for Business & Finance at Lyon College
Former VP for Business & Finance at Emory & Henry College