Developing Digital Therapeutics: The University Health Network Experience

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has been particularly revealing of the state of “eHealth”, “digital health”, and “virtual care” in addressing the needs of healthcare systems under the strain of demand and the restrictions brought on by public health concerns of the spread of the virus. The vast majority of what was deployed to address the needs of patients and providers were video conferencing platforms, which were quickly eschewed due to poor usability and increased scrutiny over privacy and security concerns and replaced with the simple telephone. Even this modest use of technology was short-lived, as most returned to in-office visits when public health directives allowed for it or when virtual care billing codes expired