This episode of Quality Matters features Misty Milby, VP of Clinical Business Development at Everlywell, and Claire Mendelson, Product Manager at NCQA.

To illuminate what makes virtual care safe, effective and sustainable, Misty and Claire unpack NCQA’s new Virtual Care Accreditation program. They explore five essential standards that define excellence in virtual primary and urgent care—and share insights from Everlywell’s experience piloting the standards. Misty and Claire make a compelling case for treating virtual care as a permanent, integrated part of the health care continuum.

Listen to learn about:

• Quality and Patient Safety in Virtual Care: Virtual care must meet the same clinical and ethical standards as in-person care. Misty and Claire explain how high standards ensure rigorous quality improvement and patient safety across remote modalities.
• Fixing Fragmentation Through Care Coordination: Virtual care can either bridge or widen gaps in the system. Effective care helps prevent “referral loops” and ensure seamless handoffs between virtual care and in-person providers.
• Equity Beyond Access: Equitable virtual care means more than logging in; it’s about language, culture and more. Misty shares ideas on how to tailor care to patients’ preferences, regardless of zip code or income.
• Clinician Experience Matters: Virtual care can reduce burnout, but only if it’s intuitive and sustainable. Hear how effective standards for virtual care support clinicians with better workflows, realistic panel sizes and time to recharge.

Key Quote:

“ As a clinician, I can tell you that handoff is everything. A great virtual encounter means nothing if the patient falls through the cracks afterwards or gets on this continuous referral highway, and is never able to get off of it. So NCQA really ensured for us that virtual providers have defined workflows for referrals. We had to make sure that this was really buttoned up, as we didn't want anybody to get stuck on that referral loop or fall through the cracks. We wanted to make sure that the patients experience continuous care versus fragmented care. And it's really about making sure virtual care doesn't create silos, but that it strengthens that bridge between virtual care and in-person care.”

-Misty Milby

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Time Stamps:

(04:26) Misty’s Dream for Virtual Care

(08:35) Quality and Patient Safety

(10:03) Expectations for Care Coordination

(11:32) Assessing Equitable Access

(13:34) Goals for Patient and Clinician Experience

(16:29) Standards for Sharing and Exchanging Data

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Dive Deeper:

NCQA Virtual Care Accreditation

Connect with Misty Milby

Connect with Claire Mendelson