Expanded telehealth is here to stay, members of the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission agreed at their September public meeting.

What they do not yet know is in what form.

Among the issues that need to be addressed in any post-COVID-19 expansion of Medicare-covered telehealth services are:

• Whether affording access to telehealth services would exacerbate the digital divide and leave some Medicare beneficiaries with less access to care than others.
• Whether audio-only coverage, temporarily permitted during the pandemic, should be continued.
• Whether greater use of telehealth might foster greater use of low-value services.
• Whether use of non-HIPAA-compliant video technology should continue to be permitted.

Learn more about MedPAC’s deliberations on telehealth in the Healthcare Dive article “MedPAC commissioners hint at telehealth policies that may stick post-COVID-19” and see the presentation that formed the basis for the discussion of this issue at MedPAC’s recent public meeting.