CCTS-Supported ECHO Act Passes in the U.S. Senate

The ECHO Act to increase access to quality health care for rural Americans passed unanimously in the U.S. Senate today. Project Expanding Capacity for Health Outcomes (ECHO) is a telehealth system for bringing high quality medical training to health care providers including those in underserved areas. The bill was co-sponsored by Senators Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and Brian Shatz (D-HI) and supported by a number of University of Utah physicians and scientists including the directors of Utah CCTS, Carrie Byington, M.D., and Willard Dere, M.D.

“The ECHO Act legislation will increase access to high-quality health care for both patients and providers in many hard to reach regions, improving the care of rural populations and expanding the medical knowledge of providers who are closest to them,” said Vivian Lee M.D., Ph.D., M.B.A., CEO of University of Utah Health Care in a statement.

“We have seen the additional benefit of ECHO for increasing the access of individuals in rural or other underserved areas to clinical trials,” Byington and Dere said in a joint statement. “We have worked to evaluate new methods of prenatal care and we see opportunities to bring cancer clinical trials and other potentially life-saving trials to our state.”

In one CCTS-supported ECHO project, which is being carried out in collaboration with the Utah Department of Health, obstetrician Erin Clark, M.D., is leading an initiative to educate and train health care providers across Utah in the latest methods for preventing mothers from dying at childbirth. The problem may sound like a relic from pioneer days, but it is surprisingly common today.

“It’s possible that up to 93 percent of those deaths could have been prevented if health care providers had known how to spot warning signs and know what to do about them,” says Clark. Using the ECHO video conferencing system, her team has held in-depth sessions with providers at 18 hospitals so far, many in remote areas of the state. These virtual visits have saved over 10,000 miles and 180 hours of travel, giving providers access to expertise that they may not have had the time or finances to seek otherwise.

Rural providers aren’t the only ones who benefit. “I think of ECHO as a knowledge sharing network,” says Clark. “We learn as much from the providers we hold sessions with as they do from us.”