I would like to point out another facet of the coronavirus crisis that is not being adequately addressed.
Our medical office is seeing only about 10 percent of the usual patient volume, to protect both patients and staff. Telehealth is coming, but I hear there will initially be only one workstation for four providers. MaineHealth is working on ramping this up, but there’s been no word when this will happen.
The country should aim to have all doctors on telehealth by the end of this month so that patients don’t get sicker waiting for the virus crisis to pass. This will cost money to improve bandwidth, so Congress should add funding for this in another stimulus package if it’s not already addressed in the current one.
Let’s act now to fix this as soon as possible! Sick patients can’t wait until the crisis passes.
Peter Bridgman, M.D.
Yarmouth
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