31 JULY 2023 – ARTICLE IN TECHREG CHRONICLE

No more waiting room: regulating telehealth in South Africa

South Africa’s telehealth guidelines, which were in place up until July 2022, were temporarily relaxed during the pandemic to allow health care workers to use telehealth more extensively. The most pivotal change was related to regulations around when telehealth services can be offered. Before COVID-19, telehealth could not be used for first time consultations between patients and healthcare professionals. This hampered the use of telehealth as it required an established relationship or a doubling up of providers (one in the room, and one digital). This temporary relaxation has since been made permanent, an important step toward improving access to telehealth. However, there is still room to grow. This paper makes the case for using “regulatory sandboxes” to incentivize innovation while still protecting patients and providers as the seek, and deliver, quality healthcare.

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