In the end, the biggest job-saving virtue of telemedicine may be that it can provide the peace of mind needed by caregivers to focus on work.
Telemonitoring allows family members to be actively engaged with the care of loved ones and to share information with doctors without being there constantly, says Dr. Archelle Georgiou, author of Healthcare Choices: 5 Steps to Getting the Medical Care You Want and Need.
She recalls adult children in southern Minnesota who had a mother who lived in the same town; she was in her early 90s.
Because the children installed equipment that allowed them to find out whether she had fallen, opened the refrigerator to eat or gone to the bathroom, they were able to care for her 24/7 without having to stop by every day.
With 90 percent of large employers planning to offer telemedicine services to their workers this year, the value and cost savings of the technology have become attractive to corporate executives.
They very well might be using it to aid ailing parents and children, while at the same time eliminating caregiving distractions that could get in the way of their business responsibilities.
“Technology is incredibly important in helping support employees who are also caring for a loved one with an age-related chronic condition,” said Drew Holzapfel, who helped develop a coalition of 40 companies supporting employee caregiving called ReACT (it stands for “Respect A Caregivers Time.”) “Use of telemedicine can allow employee caregivers to better meet their personal and professional demands.”