Med Center Health to use grant to close Telehealth gap in rural communities
BOWLING GREEN, Ky. – Med Center Health will be using a grant from the United States Department of Agriculture to add technology to their rural hospitals in Albany, Franklin, Coverna and Scottsville.
The upgrades to their Telehealth offerings will allow patients in those smaller communities to consult with specialists in Bowling Green.
The grant of just under $1 million, with Med Center Health providing a 15% match, will provide digital smart panels for the patient rooms in these four rural hospitals.
Eric Hagan, vice president of Rural Hospitals with Med Center Health, says, “We’re trying to figure out ways to where we can provide more care, higher levels of care, additional services remotely to where people are at in rural facilities. This will give us the ability to do that. There’s something called virtual nursing. It’ll give us the ability to take advantage of the limited workforce that’s gone into health care.”
Telemedicine has been growing in Kentucky in response to a lack of resources in rural areas and a shortage in the workforce.
Med Center Health says they may have only done 20 remote consults a year when they first started the service, but now they are doing tens of thousands.
They expect the technology to be in place by the summer of next year.
