Advancing telehealth with Amwell

Today, healthcare organizations are reimagining how care is delivered. While many organizations were already beginning to embrace telehealth at the start of the year, the global COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated this trend virtually overnight—for instance, according to HHS data, Medicare primary care visits delivered virtually grew from less than one percent in February of 2020 to more than 40 percent in April. And, telehealth is here to stay: A study from Frost & Sullivan analysts forecasts a “sevenfold growth in telehealth by 2025.” 

At Google Cloud, we are committed to helping the healthcare industry transform to meet today’s extraordinary challenges and to build a platform for the future that enables high quality, efficient, and cost-effective care from anywhere. A comprehensive, patient-friendly telehealth system is critical to providing high quality virtual care. 

Imagine a not too distant future in which your visit begins with a customized greeting and relevant information in a digital waiting room. A conversational chatbot agent is immediately available to assist you, in your preferred language, by asking about your symptoms and the reason for your visit, and provides this information to your physician before she enters your virtual exam room. During your appointment, you continue to speak in your preferred language to your physician, while cloud-based artificial intelligence (AI) provides live, translated captioning of the conversation. 

Before, during, and after the appointment, AI and conversational agents simplify, automate, or offload your providers’ routine tasks, such as filling out common intake forms or collecting insurance information, so they are free to focus on you. Your health information like medication, symptoms, and records from your past visits are immediately available during your telehealth visit and afterwards, your medical records are immediately updated, privately and securely. Your doctor can quickly share notes, fill prescriptions, send relevant information and schedule a follow-up visit via email.

The same technology that powers this telehealth platform can also enable providers to have better, ongoing monitoring of patients in home health situations as well as for those managing chronic conditions, by leveraging sophisticated data analytics tools in the cloud to help providers monitor and flag interventions at the right time.

Today, we announced a new partnership with Amwell to help the healthcare industry transform for a world that is more reliant on telehealth, and to ensure that healthcare organizations and providers are equipped with telehealth solutions that provide holistic and secure experiences, support HIPAA compliance, are fully-integrated, and that will enable cohesive, patient-friendly journeys through the healthcare system.

Google Cloud and Amwell will closely partner to bring telehealth solutions to healthcare organizations around the world, leveraging Amwell’s telehealth platform running on Google Cloud and integrating Google Cloud’s capabilities in areas including artificial intelligence (especially natural language processing and translation services), services aimed at secure handling of healthcare data in the cloud and enabling healthcare data interoperability, as well as collaboration tools like G Suite. We’ll work together to bring these solutions to market, helping expand access to virtual care among our mutual customers and the global healthcare industry. 

As part of this strategic partnership, Google Cloud will invest $100 million into Amwell to evolve and scale its telehealth portfolio to serve the needs of providers, insurers, and patients. You can read more about our partnership with Amwell here.

Over the coming months and years, patients will expect healthcare organizations to offer a comprehensive, seamless, and friendly virtual care experience. It’s critical that organizations are thinking today about building this platform for the future. We’re committed to partnering with the healthcare industry to adapt, prepare, and thrive in the new future.