Virtual care was again at the forefront during the third quarter of the 2020 eHealth year, with telehealth and remote monitoring being harnessed across the country as the second wave of the coronavirus pandemic arrived.

Victoria, the hardest hit state, rolled out a number of initiatives to help manage the pandemic, including Alfred Health and Monash Health, which introduced a intelligent decision-support system called CovidCare to monitor patients who had tested positive for COVID-19 and were self-isolating at home.

The University of Melbourne launched a clinical trial of a remote monitoring solution also called CovidCare in general practices and respiratory clinics, with patients in self-isolation or quarantine provided with an app to self-monitor their physical symptoms and to identify mental health needs. By October, this trial had recruited 24 clinics around the country and was being expanded to use the app to help patients deal with long COVID – patients who continue to suffer COVID-related symptoms for weeks and months after infection – and in future with common chronic diseases.