A partnership between the University of Utah Hospital’s Department of Telemedicine and TruClinic—a virtual clinic connecting doctors with patients online—will enable patients and practitioners to have video-based online visits and consultations with just a computing device, internet connection, and webcam.
TruClinic is a cloud-based telehealth portal that enables health systems, provider groups, and specialty practices to offer online, clinically meaningful consultations to their patients through video, secure messaging, and VOIP (voice over IP). The TruClinic platform is helping the University of Utah remove the barriers of location, allowing more patients to access high quality healthcare.
TruClinic and the Salt Lake City-based University of Utah Healthcare have been in a pilot phase for three months, serving a small subset of patients with much success, according to officials. The relationship that has been formalized includes aggressive plans to make the service available system-wide where appropriate. "University of Utah HealthCare is committed to providing care that local and regional patients need in the communities we serve,” Nathan Gladwell, administrative director of telehealth for the University of Utah Hospitals and Clinics, said in a statement. “Telemedicine offers our physicians a solution for connecting with their patients that live in all communities. Our efforts are geared toward removing any barriers in the way of the all-important patient-physician relationship."