What You Should Know:
– The Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC), South Carolina’s only comprehensive academic health system, announced it is expanding its efforts to provide virtual care technology to school health clinics.
– In partnership with virtual care company TytoCare, MUSC is deploying Pro Smart Clinic devices in 150 schools across the Charleston region. The Pro Smart Clinic solution replaces existing telehealth carts, allowing the schools to add more virtual care stations, with more exam capabilities.
TytoCare’s Pro Smart Clinic Enhances School Health Services and Reduces Healthcare Burden
TytoCare’s Pro Smart Clinic allows healthcare providers to remotely conduct a wide range of exams, including heart and lung assessments—with AI-driven wheeze detection—throat and ear exams, and body temperature measurements. This advanced technology ensures that clinicians can perform most of the evaluations typically done during an in-person clinic visit.
In schools, the Pro Smart Clinic significantly enhances on-site health services. By enabling clinicians to resolve more health concerns directly at the school, it reduces the need for in-office doctor visits, which often lead to student absenteeism and impose time and resource burdens on parents.
TytoCare has partnered with more than 70 health systems across the United States, including MUSC, Cone Health in North Carolina, and A Plus Family HealthCare in Kentucky, to implement the Pro Smart Clinic in over 2,500 schools across 31 states. Through collaborations with federally qualified health centers and health systems like MUSC, these clinics help divert urgent care and emergency department visits by providing accurate assessments and treatments within the school setting. This approach not only prevents unnecessary trips to healthcare facilities but also ensures students remain in the classroom, thereby supporting their educational continuity.
“By deploying TytoCare’s Pro Smart Clinic devices in 150 schools across our region, MUSC is not only transforming school nurse offices into virtual care clinics but also ensuring that children have access to prompt, reliable healthcare right where they need it,” said James T. McElligott M.D., MSCR, Executive Medical Director for the MUSC Center for Telehealth.