Transforming Health Care Delivery Through Virtual Care

For well over a decade, Charlotte, North Carolina-based Atrium Health, now part of Advocate Health, has been using the tools of technology to streamline patient access to care, reduce wait times and improve the patient experience. As the COVID-19 pandemic emerged, Atrium Health built on its pioneering foundation in virtual care to, in a matter of weeks, create and implement innovative programs to bring care directly into patients’ homes, free up hospital beds and limited supplies, and increase efficiencies within the clinical setting.

Those programs now have expanded throughout the medical system to hospitals, schools, community clinics, in-home and on-demand services, as well as urgent and primary care settings.

By taking advantage of advances in medical technology, paired with the expertise of its clinicians, Atrium Health has spearheaded virtual care initiatives throughout the Carolinas, Georgia, Alabama and beyond that offer cost-effective and efficient solutions to industry-wide problems, including clinical staff shortages and burnout. More importantly, it is delivering convenient access to care for the most vulnerable members of the communities it serves – addressing the medical needs and social determinants of health that influence well-being and quality of life for those who are underprivileged or who have a generational or cultural distrust of institutional health systems. Through these efforts, Atrium Health is achieving better health outcomes and measurable increases in satisfaction among patients and staff.

Integrating virtual health care services into traditional care offers a model for the future of health care in America and a strategy that points the way toward the holy grail of health care: delivering the best medical care efficiently, resulting in improved health and lower costs.

From primary care to hospital at home, virtual nursing, behavioral health and rural health, through innovation and adaptation, Atrium Health – as part of Advocate Health – is helping reshape the future of how and where care is delivered.