1 in 3 US Consumers Now Open to Out-of-Office Doctor Visits

Health care — that once-staid bastion of paper checks, paper charts, invoices and faxes — has managed to make the omnichannel leap.

And, as PYMNTS and CareCredit found in the recent report “The ConnectedEconomy: Omnichannel Healthcare Takes Center Stage,” roughly half (46%) of more than 2,700 consumers surveyed stated that they go online and offline to meet with their health care providers to get the care that they need.

Extrapolate that data a bit, and the implication is that 119 million consumers here in the U.S. are accessing health care across various devices, through telehealth and other means — and, of course, venturing into the doctors’ offices too.

The depth and breadth of the omnichannel trend has been captured in the chart on the right, where only 14.6% of consumers engaged in in-person health care activities only, and 6.5% got their health care needs taken care of solely through digital channels.

But we note that the digital availability of care delivered across the Internet may have something to do with the frequency with which consumers tap into that care. Nearly 20% of consumers engaged with online-only providers on a monthly basis; about 14% did so weekly.  We found that one of the most common digital healthcare activities was accessing online-only healthcare sites.  Those sites have seen a 26% increase in usage since November. Engagement in telemedicine more broadly has also risen since November, with 23% growth for telemedicine appointments.