Improved Healthcare Access through Telehealth in Rural and Urban Regions – Report from ATA2021
Expanding Telehealth Access in Rural and Urban Areas: Bridging the Digital Divide
Telehealth services are becoming increasingly important in both rural and urban areas, as they offer a way to overcome geographic and infrastructure barriers to healthcare. In West Virginia, the West Virginia University Health System has established six telemedicine hubs throughout the state to provide easier access to specialists for rural communities. Patients can travel to these strategically located hubs instead of traveling to the academic medical center in Morgantown, W.Va.
In urban areas, transportation can be a major barrier to care, and a hybrid approach of telehealth and in-person services can improve access. Krisda Chaiyachati, medical director of Penn Medicine OnDemand Virtual Care, notes that community members can serve as digital health navigators to help build trust within a community and reach underserved populations.
Gary Butts, chief diversity and inclusion officer at Mount Sinai Health System, states that access disparities in urban areas, particularly for people of color and low-income patients, became more apparent during the pandemic. Eddie González-Novoa, dean of multi-hyphenates at Liberation Health Strategies, emphasizes the importance of considering lived experience when implementing telemedicine and tapping into community resources to address access issues.
Key strategies to expand telehealth access include expanding reliable broadband and technology access, leveraging AI and telehealth innovations, adapting telehealth delivery to local needs, addressing the digital divide beyond connectivity, supporting policy and reimbursement frameworks, and innovative care delivery models. Building out stable, affordable high-speed internet is critical, especially in rural and low-income urban areas with poor connectivity. Federal programs like USDA grants, FCC initiatives (RDOF, BEAD), and HRSA funding support expanding digital infrastructure to underserved communities.
AI can augment telehealth by improving diagnostics, automating administrative tasks, and enhancing patient-provider communication in resource-limited settings. This technology can extend specialty care to remote areas, improve efficiency, and reduce healthcare disparities. Telehealth can reduce travel burdens and provider shortages by enabling virtual consultations, chronic disease management, mental health services, and follow-ups accessible from home, tailored to rural patients or underserved urban populations.
Ensuring device availability (smartphones, computers), improving digital literacy through education and support, and considering language, cultural preferences, and health literacy remove barriers that limit telehealth adoption, especially among elderly, low-income, minority, and disabled populations. Sustaining and expanding telehealth-friendly policies and payment models beyond emergency pandemic measures enable ongoing provider participation and patient access. Programs like ARPA-H’s PARADIGM seek to deploy mobile, technology-equipped clinics with integrated diagnostics and AI support to bring hospital-level care directly to rural communities, mitigating hospital closures and care access gaps.
Traci Thibodeaux, CEO of Beauregard Health System in DeRidder, La., has deployed a telemedicine strategy to address the difficulty in recruiting specialists. Advanced practice providers facilitate virtual visits with specialists located at one of WVU's hospitals. The implementation of telehealth at Beauregard Health System has had wonderful, unintended consequences, such as fewer patient transfers to tertiary centers and improved nurse education. Shannon McAllister, assistant vice president of population health and telemedicine for the hospital system, emphasized the importance of listening to patients and understanding their barriers to care when formulating a telemedicine plan.
However, uncertainty over telehealth reimbursement after the public health emergency ends is a challenge for expanding telehealth services at WVU. Adimika Arthur, executive director at HealthTech 4 Medicaid, highlights that reimbursement, licensure, parity, geography, and community infrastructure remain barriers to care for many in urban areas, including access to broadband in some public housing.
The ATA2021 event is running through June 29, and readers are encouraged to follow updates on Twitter at @HealthTechMag, @AmericanTelemed, and using the hashtags #ATA2021 and #GoTelehealth. Broadband access can be a challenge for people in both rural and urban areas, and bringing affordable fiber-optic internet to rural communities is vital for improving telehealth access. In some cases, a physician visits Beauregard Health System two days a week and then supports the hospital via a telehealth platform at other times.
Together, these measures offer a comprehensive approach: improving infrastructure, technology use, equitable access, education, financial incentives, and care innovation are all needed to overcome the challenges of geographic and digital divides in both rural and urban settings. This integrated effort helps ensure telehealth is effective, inclusive, and bridges existing health disparities.
- In rural and urban areas, addressing health-and-wellness needs through telehealth services requiresfocusing on expanding reliable broadband and technology access, as well as building out stable, affordable high-speed internet, particularly in areas with poor connectivity.
- In urban areas, science-based innovations like AI can augment telehealth by improving diagnostics, automating administrative tasks, and enhancing patient-provider communication in resource-limited settings, bridging health-and-wellness gaps for underserved populations.
