The Health Benefits of Virtual Care for School Employees
January 24th, 2025 | 2 min. read
Virtual care, a benefit that became enormously popular during the COVID-19 pandemic, has now become a standard. Data from McKinsey & Company shows 14-17% of medical visits are conducted via telehealth, compared with 1% in February 2020.
Whether offered for preventive care, acute care, or mental health needs, virtual care offers tremendous value, particularly for high-stress career fields like education. Read on to learn more about the benefits of adding virtual care to your roster of teacher health benefits.
Improves Access
Virtual care for teachers and school staff allows employees to improve their health and well-being in a way that fits their schedules — whether that’s logging in for a health visit at the beginning of the day or during a prep period. This eliminates barriers they’d face in the traditional care model, including travel time and lengthy stays in waiting rooms.
Recent consumer research conducted by ECG Management Consultants found the average wait time for the third next available appointment across 11 medical specialties in 23 U.S. metro areas is 38 days. But with virtual care, patients can often nab same- or next-day appointments, avoiding the consequences of delaying care.
Boosts Engagement
When care is easier to access, employees are more likely to engage with the benefit offering, leading to better outcomes.
“Being able to pop on during your conference period, your lunch, before school, after school, and being able to have a virtual visit with your nurse practitioner, it's just easy,” says Sheri Rich, Director of Human Resources for Keller ISD, an Independent School District in Tarrant County, Texas.
The district boasts an engagement rate above 80% for high-risk employees.
See how we helped Keller ISD save more than $31 million in healthcare costs
Benefits Mental Health
Workers in the education field experience high levels of stress and burnout. Virtual care provides an avenue for much needed mental healthcare.
“With the increase in behavioral and mental issues with children and young adults, it has become increasingly hard to manage a classroom,” says Kristen Orlando, LMHC, Behavioral Health Specialist for St. Johns County School District. “School staff are feeling immense levels of stress and many deal with depression and anxiety. [Through behavioral health care] patients are able to learn tools to better balance their life and workload and acquire strategies to manage moments of heightened symptoms. With this, they feel more able to do their job and do it well.”
Read more about how St. Johns County School District saved more than $1,300 per engaged employee and spouse
Average results for Marathon Health’s behavioral care option, LiveBetter™, include:
- Lower healthcare costs, with 45% savings for engaged patients using both mental health and primary care services
- 29% of patients significantly reducing severe depression symptoms
- 34% of patients significantly reducing severe anxiety symptoms
Enhances Teacher Satisfaction
Better access to care leads to higher utilization, and ultimately happier, healthier employees. This reduces absenteeism and presenteeism and boosts retention.
In a field where data shows 86% of U.S. K-12 public schools report challenges hiring teachers for the 2023-2024 school year and 83% report trouble hiring for staff positions, offering valuable benefits proves critical.
CareAnywhere™
Marathon Health’s virtual care network, CareAnywhere™, provides the following:
- Consistent care continuity: Unlike other virtual healthcare platforms, patients meet with the same provider each visit, allowing them to build a trusting relationship and work toward goals together.
- Health coaching: Providers offer recommendations for preventive measures to ensure continuity of care and optimal health outcomes, as well as in-depth counseling for chronic care management.
- Acute care: Quick access to treatments for common health conditions such as cough, flu, allergies, rashes, fever, headaches, and more.
- Care coordination: When in-person care is needed, our dedicated telehealth RNs guide patients to care covered within their benefit plan.
Implementing comprehensive virtual care solutions enables school districts to create a more supportive, healthy workplace while improving employee satisfaction and engagement. This investment in staff wellness not only benefits individual employees, but strengthens the entire educational community.
Interested in knowing what this looks like in the real world? Read more of our case studies featuring education and school system client partners.