Strahm believes they are saving Medicare a good deal of money when they don't have to admit one of their residents to a psychiatric hospital because ViaTV Phones are providing a healthcare conduit between psychiatrist and patient. That can be a thousand dollars a day savings. But we are winning the battle and the war as we address clinicians' legitimate concerns. The technology benefits the patients. Instead of a doctor seeing a patient once a month, they can see their patient at least once a week.
Clinicians are more able to monitor behavior and detect deterioration in a patient's condition.
We have to be able to justify the economic issues as well as the quality of care issues. At a time when reimbursement for telepsychiatry services is still patchy at best, the affordable price of the ViaTV Phone takes the technology costs completely out of the picture. Before acquiring ViaTV Phones, Reid said they tried to employ a PC-based videophone but had many problems with the video and audio qualities. Also problematic was that most of the nursing home staff lacked computer training and were intimidated by PC-based video conferencing. This is the first product that we actually could put in a patient's home.