Overview

Leveraging a consultative model, our services build strong clinical and operational partnerships to meet the neurology coverage needs of hospitals ranging in size from ten to hundreds of beds.

Virtual Visits may be conducted as follow up appointments for existing and qualifying Mass General Neurology patients. For Virtual Visit information, please visit theCenter for TeleHealth website.
Acute TeleStroke and Emergency TeleNeurology – 30+ Hospitals

You will receive 24/7 coverage by board certified Mass General or Brigham and Women’s Hospital vascular neurology & neurocritical care subspecialists within 5 minutes. True to the academic medical center model, where medical education is part of day-to-day care delivery, vascular and neurocritical care clinical fellows work together with the faculty during the consultations. Typical conditions include acute stroke, particularly for thrombolytic and endovascular therapy evaluations, hemorrhagic strokes, aneurysm evaluations, coma, spinal cord injury, status epilepticus and non-traumatic acute weakness.

Download Emergency TeleNeurology Brochure (PDF)

License and Advisory Services

The Consult Advisory Services and Portal License Program was originally designed to enable academic medical centers and health systems to create their own TeleStroke networks. It now supports health care systems that share the mission of specialty care (including behavioral health, neonatal medicine, oncology, dermatology, cardiology, intensive care, to list a few) in their regions, driven by a focus on clinical quality. With 20-plus years of experience and continuous improvement, highlights of the service include:

  • Mass General TeleHealth Consult Portal License—the HIPAA-compliant and white-labeled web application provides: 
    • Workflow and documentation management
    • Clinical/business intelligence reporting functionality
    • Single entry tool for providers enabling centralized access to video, radiology, protocols, guides and EHR (with FHIR API integration) driving program scalability
    • Flexible clinically customizable modular architecture 
  • Program materials and license and advisory services include customizable guidance on: 
    • Finance and regulatory program framework
    • Operations
    • Technology decision making support 
  • A collaborative relationship that includes bi-yearly meetings, quarterly newsletters and regularly communication to assure optimization of services along with research collaboration opportunities
Routine and Urgent TeleNeurology – 10+ Hospitals
Reviewing patient records

You will receive 24/7 coverage by Mass General Neurology faculty. The largest consult program by volume, this program offers expedient access to top quality expertise. Typical conditions include headache, encephalopathy, vertigo, weakness, cognitive changes, seizures, and non-scheduled subacute stroke.

Download Routine/Urgent TeleNeurology Brochure (PDF)

Highlights:

  • 95% of consultations result in a recommendation to remain in the community
  • 1 – 1.5 hospitalization days saved per inpatient consultation, given under 60-minute median response time for routine consults and under 15 minutes for urgent consults
TeleNeuroCritical Care

You will receive 24/7 coverage by Mass General Neurology faculty, covered by board-certified or board-eligible neurocritical care subspecialists. These consultations are used to treat a wide variety of complex conditions such as traumatic brain injury, spinal cord injury, stroke, intracerebral hemorrhage, subarachnoid hemorrhage, encephalitis, etc. TeleNeuroCritical Care is offered through both a collaborative scheduled rounding and an urgent consult model.

Highlights

  • 12% rate of change to primary diagnosis
  • 35-minute average consult duration
TeleEEG Interpretations

TeleEEG service is available 24/7 for remote interpretations of inpatient, emergency room and/or outpatient EEG studies by Mass General Clinical Neurophysiologists. Subspecialty (e.g. pediatric) interpretations are also available.

Program Workflow

Request

The local physician (or their designee) requests the consults via the Mass General TeleHealth Portal (or as a backup, via phone through our 1-800 number), conveniently sharing any necessary medical information (e.g., radiology studies, labs, progress notes).

Review

The TeleNeurology consultant begins the assessment of the submitted information and contacts the requesting physician (or designee). A live neurological assessment will be provided as necessary or requested. Together, the requesting physician and the TeleNeurology consultant decide on the plan of care.

Documentation, Follow-up and Feedback

The TeleNeurology specialist documents the information within the Mass General Telehealth Consult Portal. You can access the final note via an integration with your local EHR, within the Portal or via a secure fax. Follow-up consults are easily requested, and feedback is solicited on every consult completed.

Implementation Process

The implementation process is streamlined to ensure you have the appropriate technology and training to effectively serve your patients. Our program will guide you through every step of the process and will ensure you have the clarity and information you need to move forward swiftly. Once your local medical and technical champions have been identified, we begin deployment and testing of your technologies. We then conduct carefully designed training sessions, leveraging a train the trainer model. Your staff will have the confidence to treat your patients accurately and safely. During our last training session, we will simulate a video consult as a final test of your new expertise. After go-live, our teams continue to work together to identify areas for continuous improvement and review quality metrics.