{"id":4379,"date":"2020-08-18T10:07:29","date_gmt":"2020-08-18T17:07:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/?p=4379"},"modified":"2020-08-18T10:07:29","modified_gmt":"2020-08-18T17:07:29","slug":"university-of-maryland-delivers-telehealth-services","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.poly.com\/university-of-maryland-delivers-telehealth-services\/","title":{"rendered":"The University of Maryland Delivers Telehealth Services to Underserved Communities"},"content":{"rendered":"
Telemedicine as a medium for providing patient care had been steadily on the rise for years \u2014 yet, still not as prevalent as face-to-face appointments<\/a><\/span>. We now find ourselves in a world where COVID-19 has altered nearly every aspect of our lives \u2014 from work<\/a><\/span>, school<\/a><\/span>, medical, psychiatric<\/a><\/span>, interacting with legal systems<\/a><\/span>, and even running governments<\/a><\/span>. The need to convene has come to rely heavily on voice and video technologies to keep life moving while keeping everyone healthy.<\/p>\n When thinking about the medical system in particular, it\u2019s not hard to imagine the benefits of virtual appointments. Among the most obvious, allowing vulnerable populations to stay home while safeguarding the health of our essential healthcare workers.<\/p>\n We recently spoke with Dave Flax, Director of Information Systems for the University of Maryland Baltimore\u2019s (UMB) Department of Psychiatry to learn more about how their infrastructure relies on Poly. For the past five years, Flax and his team have been facilitating telehealth and telepsych consults and counseling to rural communities in Eastern Maryland via an off-site roaming RV equipped with video endpoints.<\/p>\n The RV turned-mobile-care-unit is part of a Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) federal government-funded grant to provide mental health and substance abuse services to under-serviced communities in Maryland and is headed by Eric Weintraub, MD, Addiction Research and Medical Director at UMB. Working together, Weintraub and Flax determined the necessary attributes to meet both the practitioner-patient needs as well as the infrastructure and technology required to facilitate remote telehealth counseling and services. Specifically, the grant aims to provide care to underserved populations requiring psychiatry or mental health counseling and substance abuse resources for the Caroline County Department of Juvenile Services.<\/p>\n <\/p>\nBringing Care to Patients<\/strong><\/h4>\n