Briefing / Near me: assessing the financial impact of Scotland’s video consultation service
Near Me is a secure video calling service that allows patients and service users to attend consultations from home or wherever is convenient. It was procured by the Scottish Government in 2016 and the first patient was seen in 2017.
The Covid-19 pandemic resulted in a 50-fold increase in video consultations, and it is now used by over 50 specialties. The platform is now being used in secondary and primary healthcare and social care settings and is being rolled out to prisons and the housing and social security sectors. Work is ongoing to introduce group consultations.
While there is evidence that there are financial savings as well as social and environmental benefits, there has been no financial assessment at the organisational level. This briefing, sponsored by the HFMA Scotland Branch, was the first step to identifying the information that NHS bodies may need to collect to make this assessment.
The briefing considers how the financial impact can be assessed – at the national level, the patient level and through the value lens. However, to assess the costs at a patient or organisational level specific financial information needs to be collected.
The Covid-19 pandemic resulted in a 50-fold increase in video consultations, and it is now used by over 50 specialties. The platform is now being used in secondary and primary healthcare and social care settings and is being rolled out to prisons and the housing and social security sectors. Work is ongoing to introduce group consultations.
While there is evidence that there are financial savings as well as social and environmental benefits, there has been no financial assessment at the organisational level. This briefing, sponsored by the HFMA Scotland Branch, was the first step to identifying the information that NHS bodies may need to collect to make this assessment.
The briefing considers how the financial impact can be assessed – at the national level, the patient level and through the value lens. However, to assess the costs at a patient or organisational level specific financial information needs to be collected.
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