Evaluation Plan for Intermountain's TeleHealth Critical Care and Hospitalist Admission and Transfer Program (Quarterback Program)

Current communication and information technologies allow one to connect and exchange information with a variety of people and systems instantaneously. While this can enrich lives socially, it also plays an integral role in the delivery of telehealth. The Office of the National Coordinator of Health Information Technology (2019) defines telehealth as "the use of electronic information and telecommunications technologies to support long-distance clinical healthcare, patient and professional health-related education, public health and health administration." It is hypothesized that Intermountain's Quarterback program physicians assign patients to the appropriate level of care indicated by their acuity and diagnosis at time of assessment and disposition. Thus, the leading research question is: After consultation, particularly when there is a change in disposition relative to the initial request, by Intermountain's Quarterback program, is the disposition at the Intermountain facility appropriate based on the acuity of the patient? Before answering this question, however, there is a need to design and prepare for an evaluation. Thus, the following objectives, are the focus of this paper: a) Identify quality metrics and a high-level evaluation plan b) Identify data requirements and the quality and availability of the required data, and c) Recommend enhancements to capture data required for assessing quality metrics