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After as many as 48% of U.S. patients deferred routine health care during the COVID-19 pandemic, healthcare organizations across the industry are seeing signs of increasing demand for preventative care. What’s more, groundbreaking digital innovations in healthcare are rapidly accelerating the shift towards preventive care at scale. Innovations like predictive analytics, remote patient monitoring, and digital navigation and engagement technology have the potential to make preventative care more accessible, lifting the burden of chronic disease on our health systems, and ultimately, delivering higher-value care that’s focused on enabling the healthiest outcomes.
The return and rise of preventative care has immense benefits for patients and the healthcare systems that support them. For example, studies show that engaging in annual visits with a primary care provider leads to 19% lower odds of premature death and 33% savings on healthcare costs. So, where do healthcare organizations invest to meet the highest demand for routine preventative services? Three specialties on the rise: nursing, chiropractic, and physical therapy.
- Nursing. With many primary care providers (PCPs) booking appointments booking weeks - or months - in the future due to large patient rosters, family nurse practitioners are more often the care provider that patients see when an urgent care need arises. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics expects demand for family nurse practitioners to rise 45% by 2030.
- Chiropractic. More than 35 million Americans seek chiropractic care annually. Beyond seeking treatment for significant neck or back pain, a recent study showed that more than 40% of patients seeking chiropractic care reported doing so for the purpose of “optimizing health” or “preventing illness.” Demand is expected to rise 7% by 2030.
- Physical therapy. More sedentary lifestyles due to the rise in office - or remote - work and an aging population are leading to a much higher demand for physical therapy than in prior decades. The need for physical therapists is projected to grow by 21% before 2030, which is much faster than the 8% average growth rate across all U.S. occupations. The good news is that patients who used physical therapy as their first treatment had 75% lower costs than a group that went straight to surgery for back pain.
As the American public returns to the doctor’s office for long-deferred routine care needs, the healthcare industry will see a rise in demand in the next few years - particularly in nursing, chiropractic, and physical therapy. An increase in preventative care will be a boon for patients, providers, and those organizations that support them, as more care options that provide earlier treatment reduce cost, administrative burden, and improve healthcare outcomes and burden on the healthcare system.
The digital transformation of healthcare plays a critical role in this trend - the easier it is for patients to search for and find the preventative care they need, the more streamlined our healthcare system becomes.
The Amino platform makes it easy to find, evaluate, and schedule appointments across nearly 100 provider categories, including preventative care specialists like nurse practitioners, chiropractors, physical therapists, and more. Learn more about our full range of supported specialties here.
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