Enhancing Quality of Life for Seniors through Remote Care

Remote healthcare is making life easier for many older adults. In the past, doctor visits required patients to travel to meet with a health practitioner in person, no matter the purpose of the appointment. Thanks to advancements in telehealth and virtual care, older adults now have access to primary care and specialists from the comfort of their own homes. Thanks to reliable new video technology, SOAP (Subjective, Objective, Assessment, Plan) notes, real time transcription and translation, and devices that support remote care – many patients can receive virtual care that is on par or sometimes better than in person care.

Telehealth benefits for seniors

In a recent study conducted by the NCBI, researchers found that telehealth services are benefiting seniors in a variety of ways:

Convenience

For older people, transportation to visit a specialist can be difficult. Traveling to a facility presents challenges for seniors suffering from visual impairments or other physical ailments. Depending on the mode of transportation, visiting a specialist in person can be a costly endeavor. With telehealth, patients can benefit from less need to travel for routine appointments and check ins.

Reduced risk of infection

By attending more appointments from home, elderly patients find that telehealth visits pose less detriments to their health. By staying home, individuals safeguard against airborne illness and diseases that can be contracted at in-person facilities.

Time saved

Most notably, older adults find that virtual visits save them precious time. By staying home, they can take advantage of avoiding lengthy wait times and queues while also eliminating any travel time. As one older patient put it, “I don’t have to waste my time coming in for checkups”

Immediate access

Thanks to the general availability of doctors online, it is now easier than ever for patients to get access to round the clock care. Virtual visits tend to be easier to schedule for immediate support compared to in person. By reducing unnecessary in person visits, ER visits, and readmissions, patients can also save money.  

Remote monitoring

Studies have found that using remote patient monitoring devices at home can significantly benefit elderly patients. Through the advent of blood pressure monitors, vital monitors, glucose monitors, etc., these types of technologies reduce the necessity of scheduling in-person appointments for routine checks. These devices also facilitate regular monitoring and management of chronic conditions such as diabetes, hypertension, and heart disease, allowing for timely interventions and adjustments in treatment plans. Remote monitors also provide a lifeline to patients who need round-the-clock supervision. Through PTZ (Pan Tilt Zoom) and third-party cameras, care providers can remotely monitor patients in the comfort of their homes. This provides a net benefit to doctors and patients regarding convenience and general access.

Additional benefits:

• Support for Caregivers: Telehealth can provide caregivers with resources, guidance, and support, helping them manage the care of older adults more effectively.
• ‍Mental Health Services: Telehealth can offer access to mental health services, such as counseling and therapy, which might be difficult to access otherwise.
• ‍Educational Resources: Telehealth platforms often provide educational resources that can help older adults understand their conditions better and manage their health proactively.

Overcoming challenges in providing remote care for seniors

Providing remote care for seniors presents several challenges that need to be addressed to ensure effective and equitable healthcare delivery.

Challenge: Unreliable internet connections

Key amongst these challenges is that reliable internet access may be unavailable or limited, especially in rural or low-income areas. Poor call quality can lead to misunderstandings between senior patients and healthcare providers, potentially impacting the accuracy of diagnoses and the effectiveness of prescribed treatments. High-quality interactions can enhance patient trust and satisfaction, contributing to their willingness to use telehealth services again. Providers can make more accurate assessments when they see and hear their patients without interruptions caused by technical issues.‍

Solution:

Using Agora’s real-time video technology to power your telehealth application makes it possible to provide high quality calls to all patients, even those with poor connections. Agora achieves this by accommodating lower video resolutions and lower bitrates, using newer codecs (like VP9) to provide high-quality video feeds in low bandwidth environments. The bandwidth efficiency of VP9 allows telehealth services to be accessible even in areas with limited internet resources. This is particularly beneficial for reaching patients with constrained bandwidth in rural or underserved regions. Agora’s network complements this by minimizing bandwidth usage without sacrificing video quality, ensuring that telehealth services are more universally accessible.

Challenge: Lack of communication clarity

Clarity of communication is critical for seniors in any health care environment. In telehealth real-time speech-to-text technology can benefit seniors by helping to address language differences, cultural nuances, and audiovisual impairments. Telehealth applications can also benefit seniors by offering written transcriptions or summaries of consultations. This allows them to ask questions about complex medical terminology that they may not fully comprehend. Also, seniors with hearing loss can read the conversation transcript, making it easier to understand medical consultations.

Solution:

Agora's advanced AI (Artificial Intelligence) ensures high accuracy even with overlapping speech and regional accents.  Additionally, integrating Agora's Speech to Text with Large Language Models (LLMs) is straightforward and does not affect performance. Transcription texts can be uploaded to LLMs to generate summaries or translate the transcript into other languages, thereby reducing language barriers and ensuring older adults understand medical advice and instructions.

Challenge: Compliance

Ensuring compliance with telehealth regulations and standards can be complex and time-consuming. Finding a fully compliant provider for voice and video calls as well as speech to text and transcription can be a major hurdle.

Solution:

Agora is ISO and SOC 2 certified and meets compliance standards for regional privacy laws and industry regulations, including GDPR, CCPA, and HIPAA. Live captions and transcription can be encrypted in the same way as encrypted RTC audio or video.

Overall, we are seeing positive outcomes from seniors adopting virtual care over in person. While there are still many types of treatments that require being in person, telehealth continues to expand its capabilities with AR/VR enabling new forms of immersive remote care. The future of elder care seems brighter than ever.

Explore Agora’s Telehealth Solutions to learn more about implementing or improving virtual care for your patients.