Telehealth supergroup enlists RACGP help

4 minute read


A second telehealth consortium featuring big industry players has landed, this time led by Patients Australia.


A group of Australia’s telehealth companies and industry bodies have launched a new consortium aiming to bring higher standards to the industry – stop us if you’ve heard this one before.

The new group, which is calling itself the Australian Telehealth Standards Consortium, was convened by advocacy body Patients Australia and includes heavy hitters like Eucalyptus, Mosh, Bupa, Wesfarmers Health and Honeysuckle Health.

Wesfarmers Health operate popular telehealth service InstantScripts, while Honeysuckle Health owns digital health platform Midnight Health.

In a media release hard-launching the consortium’s existence on Tuesday, Patients Australia said the group will co-design new telehealth standards to “ensure better, safer, virtual care” and that the RACGP would be playing a key role as a “consultation partner” throughout the process.

The Australian Telehealth Standards Consortium is not to be confused with the Telehealth Sector Working Group.

By coincidence, both groups have sprung into being at roughly the same time. Both claim to be working towards better standards for the telehealth industry and both claim to represent a broad range of stakeholders.  

Membership of the Telehealth Sector Working Group includes Consumers Health Forum, the Medical Technology Association of Australia and Headspace. Medicinal cannabis group Montu convened the group.

Patients Australia digital health ambassador Richard Skimin, who was previously CEO of InstantScripts, told The Medical Republic that the providers closest to the coalface were in the best position to provide feedback on quality and safety issues in telehealth.

“There’s lots of different stakeholders at the table, but [the Consortium] really want to put patients at the centre of the development of these telehealth standards,” Mr Skimin said.

“Secondly, you’ve got a wide group of providers out there that reach millions of Australians, and so we’ve got the best reach into the healthcare community to develop these standards.

“And then the third thing that’s different [compared to other telehealth industry groups] is that we’re collaborating with the RACGP, who are going to be providing consultation to us during this process.”

Mr Skimin acknowledged that industry voices alone would not be enough to develop robust standards, and said the Consortium aimed to “balance out” different voices.

“For a long time, providers were kind of staring at each other, waiting to see who would make the first move in terms of putting forward standards,” he said.

“Now we’re seeing lots of different providers come out and share draft standards; Bupa, Wesfarmers Health and Eucalyptus have all done that.

“But now’s the time to provide some minimum standards for the entire industry around how telehealth should work, so that there’s a baseline there that practitioners, providers and patients can rely on when they’re engaging with an accredited telehealth service.”

Eucalyptus head of public policy Lyndon Goddard said the Australian Telehealth Standards Consortium represented a “critical mass” of the country’s leading telehealth providers and would develop a “credible and comprehensive regulatory framework”.

“The rapid adoption of telehealth as a modality of care has significantly improved access for millions of Australians and will continue to play an important role in the future of healthcare,” said Midnight Health co-founder Nic Blair.

“It is critically important that the industry aligns on a set of standards that will ensure patients receive safe, high-quality care and this group provides an essential step in the right direction to not only engage its members, but the rest of the healthcare community.”

Earlier this week, Wesfarmers Health also released what it labelled a “first-of-its-kind” telehealth code of practice.

As mentioned above, several other telehealth companies and groups have also launched draft versions of telehealth standards this year. Just last week, the Telehealth Sector Working Group released the first version of its C.A.R.E. Telehealth Principles, while Eucalyptus released its best practice principles for Australian online telehealth providers in May.

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