When a patient arrives at Central Texas Medical Center in San Marcos presenting symptoms of a stroke, he or she receives a brain scan, and a mobile video conferencing cart is brought to their bedside.

By the time the scan is completed, a physician in another city appears on the screen to consult with the patient and gauge whether he or she has experienced a stroke—and needs immediate transfer to a neurologist in Austin—or is experiencing a less severe medical issue that can be cared for in-house.

Previously that patient would have had to wait many minutes for CTMC staff to get a doctor on the phone and explain the situation in order to get a recommendation for treatment.

“It has streamlined our care for these patients because time is very, very important for these patients,” said Kara Meyers, CTMC stroke and chest pain coordinator. “When you have to be making phone calls to all these hospitals trying to get a doctor on the phone … that’s very time-consuming. Now we don’t have to wait for any of that. We just hit a button, and the doctor is there.”

CTMC’s stroke-treatment strategy is one example of how telemedicine, the treatment and remote diagnosis of patients by means of telecommunications technology such as smartphones, video conferencing and other means, is being used by health care providers to improve patients’ outcomes.

Some involved in the health care industry say telemedicine could help address Texas’ physician shortage. Merritt Hawkins, a physician search and consultation firm, estimates Texas needs to add 12,819 physicians to bring it up to the nation’s per-capita average, but others believe it needs to be regulated tightly to ensure patient safety.

CommUnity Care, an Austin-based health care provider with 25 clinics in Central Texas, began using telemedicine in March 2014. Since then it has been added to 10 of the provider’s locations.

Wendy Salazar, practice manager at CommUnity Care’s Austin/Travis County Integral Care Unit, said psychiatric services are one of the primary fields served by telemedicine. The lack of necessity for a physical examination makes video-based consultations especially effective in psychiatry, she said.

Since CommUnity Care began utilizing telemedicine appointments for clients seeking psychiatric services, the provider’s “no-show” rate for first-time appointments—a closely tracked statistic for most psychiatric care providers—fell from 48 percent to about 24 percent, she said.

Dr. Kwame Asamoah owns and operates the Pflugerville-based ExpressMD Urgent Care, which recently began implementing telemedicine in its practice. The company has contracted with dozens of employers in Central Texas for work site urgent care.

When a worker is hurt on the job ExpressMD sends a technician equipped with a video-capable tablet and other medical equipment to the site. The technician is able to facilitate a consultation between the injured worker and Asamoah or another of ExpressMD’s board-certified physicians on staff.

Prescriptions can be written if necessary, and the physician can advise the worker on how to treat the injury, Asamoah said. 

“[The employer] doesn’t have to lose another worker who is going to put [the injured worker] in a car and drive him away from the work site in order to be seen,” he said. “The employer saves a lot of money that way.”

Asamoah said he does not see health care providers’ adoption of telemedicine slowing any time soon. In Texas especially, he said, the increasing patient population will make it difficult for providers to keep up with demand.

“It’s going to be more and more difficult for patients to find health care services they need, so I think this idea of telemedicine where they can be seen relatively quickly by a distant provider is actually going to become a necessity,” Asamoah said.