How Telehealth Benefits Addiction Treatment
Telehealth, also known as telemedicine, makes use of various online technologies to connect counselors to outpatient clients in their homes. It can make addiction treatment more accessible for individuals who for whatever reason cannot or choose not to participate in inpatient care.
Many outpatient treatment services can be provided via telehealth, including:
- One-on-one therapy
- Group therapy
- Addiction counseling
- Medication-assisted treatment
These services can be provided via video conferencing, telephone calls, or web-based assessments. This approach enables patients to receive the treatment they need in the privacy of their own homes via their mobile phones, tablets, or computers.
Challenges of Telehealth Addiction Treatment
One of the primary challenges in offering addiction treatment via telehealth is conducting the necessary urine drug testing. When clients provide urine samples in their own homes, delivering those samples to a lab in a timely fashion becomes an issue.
Many treatment centers require remote clients to either conduct urine testing in person (at their premises or at a reference lab) or hand-deliver samples to their location, which can can be inconvenient. In addition, when urine samples are collected at a client’s home, the risk of urine tampering increases.
This is where vTOX® comes in.
How vTOX® Supports Telehealth Addiction Treatment
Valley Medical’s vTOX® urine drug testing uses DNA verification to eliminate the need for viewed urine collection. It’s ideal for verifying urine samples not provided in person. After performing a one-time cheek swab, all future urine samples are verified against the client’s stored DNA information. This makes vTOX® a must-have for telehealth addiction treatment.
The vTOX® process is easy for counselors and treatment centers and convenient for clients. The process is simple:
- Valley Medical sends a swab kit and quantity of urine collection cups directly to your client.
- The client schedules a telehealth visit and completes a self-swab while on camera.
- The client mails the swab, in a pre-addressed envelope, to Valley Medical.
- For future urine drug tests, the client provides a urine sample in the provided collection cup and mails it directly to Valley Medical in the provided pre-addressed packaging.
- Valley Medical Laboratory analyzes the DNA in the urine sample and matches it to the client’s DNA stored from the initial cheek swab.
- You are notified via email when test results are ready so you can review them in our Partner Portal.
All postage is pre-paid by Valley Medical so there is no charge to you or your client for shipping. It’s fast and easy for all concerned.
Discover Why vTOX® is Ideal for Your Telehealth Clients
Valley Medical’s vTOX® urine drug testing is the perfect solution for treatment centers and counselors offering telehealth addiction treatment. Your clients get the convenience of in-home urine collection and you get assurance that all urine samples are valid. It’s a win-win solution for all concerned!
To learn more about Valley Medical Laboratory and our unique vTOX® urine drug testing, click here or contact us by phone at 612-471-1141 or by email at info@valleymedlab.com. We’re looking forward to discussing how Valley Medical Laboratory can help support your facility’s telehealth addiction services.
