Trending in Telehealth: May 16 – 22, 2023

By and on May 26, 2023
Posted In Telehealth

Trending in Telehealth is a series from the McDermott digital health team in which we highlight state legislative and regulatory developments that impact healthcare providers, telehealth and digital health companies, pharmacists, and technology companies that deliver and facilitate virtual care.

Trending in the past week:

  • Interstate Compacts
  • Telehealth Flexibilities

A CLOSER LOOK

Finalized Legislation & Rulemaking

  • The North Carolina General Assembly voted to override Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto of SB 20. Dubbed the Care for Women, Children, and Families Act, SB 20 operates to reduce access to reproductive health services, including by eliminating the provider’s ability to give patients information contained in the relevant consent form over the telephone. The legislation takes effect July 1.

Legislation and Rulemaking Activity in Proposal Phase

Highlights:

  • Alaska progressed legislation (SB 75) in the first chamber to join the Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology Interstate Compact.
  • Illinois progressed legislation (SB 2123) in the first chamber to adopt the Counseling Compact.
  • Oregon progressed legislation (SB 232) that would update the Oregon Medical Board’s telemedicine regulations at 52 O.R.S. §§ 677.080 and 677.137 to clarify that the practice of medicine occurs where a patient is physically located.
  • Texas continued to progress legislation (HB 1771) that would require each agency with regulatory authority over a health professional providing a telemedicine, teledentistry or telehealth to adopt rules to standardize formats for and retention of records related to a patient’s consent to treatment, data collection and data sharing.
  • Texas also progressed legislation (HB 617) in the first chamber that would establish a pilot project to provide emergency medical and prehospital care instruction through telemedicine/telehealth services by regional trauma resource centers to healthcare providers in rural area trauma facilities.

Why it matters:

  • Interstate compact adoption remains elevated. States continue to progress legislation that would enact licensure compacts across healthcare professions. This week, Alaska and Illinois took steps to adopt compacts that would ease out-of-state licensure hurdles and improve shared systems across public agencies.
  • Texas addresses rural care via telehealth. Many states are progressing legislation that would permanently extend telehealth flexibilities to allow providers to practice across counties and use technologies to reach and educate patients in rural low-access areas.

Telehealth is an important development in care delivery, but the regulatory patchwork is complicated. The McDermott digital health team works alongside the industry’s leading providers, payors and technology innovators to help them enter new markets, break down barriers to delivering accessible care and mitigate enforcement risk through proactive compliance. Are you working to make healthcare more accessible through telehealth? Let us help you transform telehealth.

Stacey Callaghan
Stacey Callaghan counsels digital health organizations, healthcare entities, and private equity clients as they navigate regulatory, compliance, and transactional issues. She focuses on assisting clients in developing telemedicine strategies and documenting multi-state telehealth arrangements given the evolving digital health regulatory landscape. As co-head of the McDermott Women’s Digital Health Initiative, Stacey focuses on aiding digital health providers of women’s health services navigate issues unique to the industry and works to help these clients successfully advance their efforts. Stacey also assists clients in matters including data privacy and protection requirements under HIPAA and other privacy laws, data breach investigations and compliance, and data sharing, licensing, and de-identification arrangements. View Stacey's full bio here.


Taylor Hood
Taylor Hood advises healthcare companies on a variety of litigation, regulatory and healthcare policy matters. Taylor focuses his practice on issues that arise in the managed care sector for both payors and providers, including provider payments, health benefits and insurance practices. Learn more about Taylor's practice: https://www.mwe.com/people/taylor-edward-hood/

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