AI Revolutionising Healthcare, says Teladoc Health
Healthcare is being changed by AI at such a lick that what counted as groundbreaking innovation six months earlier is soon eclipsed by a seemingly never-ending production line of amazing use cases.
These are exciting times for healthcare professionals, but also challenging ones. One company at the forefront of AI innovation is Teladoc Health, a multinational US telemedicine and virtual healthcare company, whose primary services include telehealth, medical opinions, AI and analytics, telehealth devices and licensable platform services.
It is one of the world's leading virtual healthcare providers, and has a global network of 40,000 medical professionals, plus around 5,000 staff, including an in-house technical innovation team.
Dr Raman-Tangella is Chief Medical Officer at Teladoc Health, and points out that roughly a quarter of Americans have access to at least one Teladoc Health product or service through their employer or health plan.
“People got to know us for virtual urgent care, but that’s changing,” she says. “Today we provide primary care, mental health, dermatology, nutrition.”
It also has a million enrollees in its chronic condition management solutions, which help people manage conditions like diabetes, pre-diabetes and hypertension.it also partners with hospitals and health systems, who use its technology to enable millions of visits each year.
The company’s expanding and evolving suite of services means that technology – and particularly AI – has never been more important.
“AI is changing what we are able to offer patients,” says Dr. Raman-Tangella. “Generative AI is helping us personalise care and how clinicians communicate with patients. We’ve found that it moves the needle and produces better outcomes and allows clinicians to spend more time focusing on patient care.”
She adds there are other ways the company is embedding AI in the care process: “Let’s say a doctor is working with a patient who needs to lose 20 pounds. In a typical setting, the doctor would see the patient occasionally, tell the patient they need to make a number of lifestyle changes, and ask them to come back in six months.”
“But,” she adds, “the doctor has no insight into what is going on in the patient’s life during those six months.”
Dr. Raman-Tangella points out that, as a doctor, there are several critical factors here, such as what the patient is eating and how that is influencing their weight. “Then there’s the question of how the patient eats on a good day versus a bad day, and how they eat on days when they sleep well, versus days they sleep less well. Also, what kind of stress do they deal with in their daily life?”
She explains that all these factors count as data points that need to be processed, examined and then acted upon, with decisions being informed by insights into what is working, and what isn’t.
“Leveraging digital health programmes that are coupled with virtual care and AI enables clinicians to have more-frequent touchpoints with patients, and also to understand what interventions and messaging resonates most with specific patients,” she says.
Dr. Raman-Tangella adds: “The volume of data that we work with in healthcare and the velocity at which it comes is impossible for humans to process.”
This, she says, is the beauty of machine learning (ML).
“Our advanced use of ML and predictive modelling has transformed and improved the way that we can engage and support individuals.”
AI is clearly delivering big-picture healthcare improvements, but it is also helping clinicians manage specific diseases more effectively.
Teladoc presented new data at the American Diabetes Association Annual Meeting in June, highlighting the growing impact of AI in diabetes management. The company showed that AI-tools are enabling better personalised health ‘nudges’ for members, which drive higher engagement levels and, as a result, better health outcomes.
“The new data shows a three-fold increase in engagement for members targeted with personalised health nudges sent to mobile or cellular connected devices,” says Dr. Raman-Tangella, who adds that users were also initially identified as being at-risk for uncontrolled diabetes through AI tools.
She adds: “Plus, diabetes members that received personalised next-best actions in their weekly email, powered by predictive modelling, were 50% more likely to engage with a health coach.”
Teladoc is also deploying other technology in conjunction with AI to enhance its services. Ambient listening is one such valuable tech.
As part of its partnership with Microsoft, it is leveraging AI and ambient listening to minimise administrative burden by automating clinical documentation. AI allows physicians to spend more time with patients than otherwise would be the case, rather than having to dedicate countless hours writing notes documenting visits.
“That’s only one example,” Dr. Raman-Tangella says. “Every day we put dozens of AI models to work, to strengthen our products and the experiences we deliver for members.”
She adds: “It includes everything from optimising appointment scheduling and quickly connecting members with a quality physician in minutes, to delivering personalised insights that empower members to take the next best action to support their health.”
Asked to gaze into her crystal ball and predict where AI might take healthcare next, Dr. Raman-Tangella says: “I am excited about the possibilities for AI and particularly the space of predictive analytics.
“Doctors don’t have access to all of a patient’s data. They have clinical data but most of the time they don’t have lifestyle data, health plan data or data about social drivers of health in one place.
“When you put it all together, we’re able to generate insights that give a care team additional tools to enable better outcomes. We can determine if the patient is on a good path or if there is something to be concerned about, and provide insights on the best way to intervene and provide the right care.
“I think of this as being ‘precision health’, and something that will empower people to take control of their health journey.
She adds: “It includes everything from optimising appointment scheduling and quickly connecting members with a quality physician in minutes, to delivering personalised insights that empower members to take the next best action to support their health.”
Asked to gaze into his crystal ball and predict where Ai might take healthcare next, Dr. Raman-Tangella says: “I am excited about the possibilities for AI and particularly the space of predictive analytics.
“Doctors don’t have access to all of a patient’s data. They have clinical data but most of the time they don’t have lifestyle data, health plan data or data about social drivers of health in one place.
“When you put it all together, we’re able to generate insights that give a care team additional tools to enable better outcomes. We can determine if the patient is on a good path or if there is something to be concerned about, and provide insights on the best way to intervene and provide the right care.
“I think of this as being ‘precision health’, and something that will empower people to take control of their health journey.
To read the full story in the magazine click HERE
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