Teladoc, Microsoft, Northwell tie-up signal rise of telehealth-Big Tech-health system team-ups

The news: Teladoc and Northwell are expanding their partnership to offer Northwell patients virtual care inside and outside of the health system.

  • Northwell is tapping a solution Teladoc’s codeveloped with Microsoft that improves clinical workflows and collaboration among Northwell providers.
  • It will be implemented at 20 of Northwell’s 22 hospitals to start, with plans to expand over time.

How we got here: Last year, Teladoc and Microsoft joined forces to integrate Teladoc’s telehealth platform (Solo) with Microsoft Teams’ video conferencing software.

They combined Teladoc’s virtual care delivery solutions with Microsoft Teams’ communication and collaboration tools to enable easier virtual care delivery for providers sans the administrative burden.

How it works:

  • Teladoc’s Solo gives clinicians a dashboard where they can schedule visits and see patients. Solo also lets them follow up post-visit, and view imaging and analytics data.
  • Microsoft Teams added stronger virtual visit tech, EHR integration, secure messaging, and care coordination capabilities to Teladoc’s virtual care solution.

To add, Northwell’s partnership could help it step into the growing D2C healthcare market.

  • Northwell’s Associate Chief Medical Officer and SVP of clinical strategy and development, Martin Doerfler, MD, said: "This relationship with Teladoc Health will allow us to optimize our direct-to-consumer telehealth programs to provide the highest quality care and access for all…”.

What’s next? We’re going to see more health systems seek partnerships with Big Tech-telehealth duos.

  • Northwell noted how its decision to work with Teladoc was swayed by Teladoc’s growing partnership with Microsoft and the combined health-tech prowess both bring to the table.
  • In another example, Amwell made a $100 million deal with Google Cloud to integrate more machine learning-powered tools, like conversational AI in virtual waiting rooms, into Amwell’s suite of telehealth services.

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