National Telehealth Use Drops Almost 4% in June

After a two-month growth period, the FAIR Health Monthly Telehealth Regional Tracker reported that in June, there was a decline in national telehealth use, along with decreases in the Northeast and South.

The Fair Health Monthly Telehealth Regional Tracker is a service that monitors changes in telehealth activity monthly by tracking various metrics such as claim lines, procedure codes, and diagnostic categories. The data reviewed by the tracker includes information for privately insured and Medicare Advantage patients but not for Medicare fee-for-Service and Medicaid beneficiaries.

Prior to June, telehealth rose steadily and maintained a high proportion of medical claim lines. According to tracker data from May, telehealth use shot up dramatically, occupying 5.4 percent of all medical claim lines, up from 4.9 percent of claim lines in April.

However, in June, national use of telehealth dropped 3.7 percent. The share of telehealth-related medical claim lines from 5.4 percent in May to 5.2 percent in June.

Several US regions also reported declines. In the Northeast, telehealth use fell 4.8 percent, and in the South, it fell 2.4 percent. However, the West reported a 2.9 percent increase, and the Midwest had no changes.

Regarding diagnoses, COVID-19 held steady among the top telehealth diagnoses, ranking second on all lists except for the South, where it ranked third. This represents a shift from April to May when COVID-19 jumped in telehealth diagnoses rankings nationally and in every region except the Northeast.

Also, developmental disorders ranked fifth on the list of top telehealth diagnoses nationally, and joint and soft tissue diseases ranked fourth — a switch from the previous month.

In the South, skin infections ranked fifth, and urinary tract infections ranked fourth, which was the opposite of their places on the list in May.

Although there were few changes with regard to specialties most using telehealth, the West reported a reduction in psychologists offering telehealth, with the specialty falling from fourth to fifth place.

The tracker reported no change in procedure codes in June in all regions and at the national level. The procedure code CPT 90837, one-hour psychotherapy, remained No. 1.

Previous releases from the tracker have often noted that in addition to the sustained prevalence of COVID-19, mental health conditions have consistently appeared on the top telehealth diagnoses list from 2020 to 2022.

Further, according to the January release of the FAIR Health Monthly Telehealth Regional tracker, this diagnosis held the No. 1 spot for three months in a row. Social workers conducted the highest number of telehealth services in January, both nationally and in every region.