In the days and weeks after former President Trump declared a national emergency over COVID-19 last March, Google searches for “doctor near me” dropped precipitously while those for “telehealth” blasted off.
By now the two terms have roughly switched places, with “doctor near me” up and still rising while “telehealth” plateaus at a rate far below its spring 2020 peak.
However, a new analysis of this data by OnlineDoctor suggests focusing not on the falloff in searches for “telehealth” but, on the contrary, in the term’s establishment of a new normal that’s 320% higher than its pre-pandemic showings.
“Perhaps the use of telehealth services and online doctors is here to stay as people try to limit their interactions with strangers to reduce their chances of getting exposed to COVID-19 or any other viruses,” the authors of the analysis comment.
OnlineDoctor cites the general public’s COVID-increased familiarity with virtual interactions across spheres of interaction—school classes, industry conferences, family visits—as a predictor of telehealth’s bright future.
“[W]e still won’t know for certain that telehealth services and online doctors are actually eating away at the market share held by in-person doctor appointments until the pandemic has been over for at least a full year,” the authors acknowledge.
Still, recent CDC data shows a bounce in the number of physicians offering virtual visits, they point out.
Considered alongside this data, the constancy of Google searches using the term “telehealth” may well indicate a long-term trend that traditional providers will need to reckon with.
“Now and when the pandemic is history, nearly all people will have a heightened sense of caution and awareness when it comes to their own health and the spreading of germs and diseases,” the authors write. “As a result, in-person visits to doctor offices, which are typically filled with sick people and contagious germs, may be greatly reduced and replaced by telehealth appointments with online doctors.”
The analysis includes a list of U.S. states ranked by those with the most searches for “telehealth” to those with the fewest in calendar years 2019 and 2020.
At or near the top for both one-year periods is South Dakota, where Gov. Kristi Noem is this month introducing legislation that would make permanent telehealth “flexibilities” that launched as temporary responses to the COVID crisis.
Dave P. has worked in journalism, marketing and public relations for more than 30 years, frequently concentrating on hospitals, healthcare technology and Catholic communications. He has also specialized in fundraising communications, ghostwriting for CEOs of local, national and global charities, nonprofits and foundations.