Online Follow up for Hospitalized Patients

I'm excited about a new program that we started today at the University of Arkansas, using the eDoc technology and team in partnership with the UAMS physicians.

We give every patient being discharged from the hospital a free subscription to our service, with the encouragement for them (or their family) to log on and ask a question or get a clarification about their recent hospitalization or other health questions that may be concerning them.

I don't know about your experience but, around here, when patients leave the hospital, it is not that easy for them to get in touch with one of the doctors associated with the hospitalization to get questions answered, etc.

So, anyway, they log on, ask our team questions and, if it is straightforward and we're comfortable answering, we do. If it needs to be passed on to one of the doctors who took care of the patient, we do that.

We're doing a three month pilot, then we'll reassess and see how we want to proceed.

What do you think of this idea? Let me hear from you.