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Bean: Telemedicine Odds Better in 2015

Leon County Judge John Cooper on June 30, 2022, in a screen grab from The Florida Channel.
Florida Senate
/
The Florida Channel
Leon County Judge John Cooper on June 30, 2022, in a screen grab from The Florida Channel.

State Sen. Aaron Bean said a proposed telemedicine bill is likely to pass this session.

Bean, chairman of the Senate Health Policy committee told a business-friendly health conference in Orlando Monday that a key is incorporating the treatment of patients using Medicaid, the public health insurance program for the poor.

“That’s what’s really going to be the spark,” said Bean, R-Fernandina Beach.We have 3.7 million people that get their health care through our Medicaid program, and we think it’s a fantastic way to increase quality, increase visits, but yet do it in an economical way that we think we might even be able to save money by using this technology.”

Bean led a panel discussion on telemedicine at the Associated Industries of Florida’s Health Care Affordability Summit, which continues today.  Health News Florida is covering the conference and its keynote speaker Eliot Fishman, a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services official who indicated the state will be losing its critical Low-Income Pool funding next year.  Check back with Health News Florida for that developing story.

Bean told business leaders at the event the state is ready to increase how it practices remote medicine.

“We can do it in many cases much more efficiently. I don’t want to say cheaper,’’ he said. “That’s a dirty word in health care.”

A telemedicine bill failed in the 2014 Legislature.  The new bill, which already has bipartisan support, is significantly simpler than last year’s 26-page effort.

“Last year we got very detailed and probably got caught up in the weeds in some of the details,” Bean sad. “The bill was 26 pages. Our current draft is 3 pages this year. So we let the free market decide.”

Abe Aboraya is a reporter with WMFEin Orlando. Health News Florida receives support from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Health News Florida reporter Abe Aboraya works for WMFE in Orlando. He started writing for newspapers in high school. After graduating from the University of Central Florida in 2007, he spent a year traveling and working as a freelance reporter for the Seattle Times and the Seattle Weekly, and working for local news websites in the San Francisco Bay area. Most recently Abe worked as a reporter for the Orlando Business Journal. He comes from a family of health care workers.