CAMPBELL COUNTY RECORDER
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Music venues, FCC stadium still being constructed Scott Wartman and Sharon Coolidge Cincinnati Enquirer USA TODAY NETWORK
Holly Specht poses for a photo with the application on her phone that she uses for telemedicine doctor visits from her home in Fort Thomas on March 24. PHOTOS BY ALEX MARTIN/THE ENQUIRER
Coronavirus in Ohio: Telemedicine explodes Terry DeMio and Anne Saker Cincinnati Enquirer USA TODAY NETWORK
Inside one month, the novel coronavirus epidemic has given telemedicine the one thing that years of its mere convenience never generated: lots of business. For years, hospital systems have nudged consumers to use the videoconference tool with their doctors. But consumers resisted, preferring in-person appointments. The health crisis this month with the new virus has turned patients such as Holly Specht of Fort Thomas into telemedicine believers. A sore toe worsened on Specht just as Kentucky and Ohio residents went under stay-at-home orders to avoid spreading the infection and reduce the stress on the health care system. "I didn't want to go to the doctor because of the people who were sick, that really needed help," she said. Her husband, Eric, called the human resources offi ce for his business, Phototype Engraving in Walnut Hills. The couple scheduled a telemedicine call, answered a questionnaire, sent in an embarrassing photo of Holly's toe and got a quick call back. "Two minutes," she said. "The whole experience was incredible." Throughout the Cincinnati area, thousands of people are using telemedicine to get care yet keep their distance from medical caregivers and others. Part of that is because the federal Department of Health and Human Services has relaxed rules on privacy issues with video visits, allowing medical providers discretion. Medicare also is reimbursing doctors for telemedicine because of COVID-19. Monday, St. Elizabeth Physicians had about 1,500 video visits scheduled, said Dr. Barry Wendt, an internist there.. St. Elizabeth had been working toward telemedicine, but the epidemic pushed matters ahead of schedule, he said. "It was in the works for the past three months with plans to roll it on over the next six months," Wendt said, "but we pulled together and got six months of work completed in three days." Guy Karrick, spokesman for St. Elizabeth Healthcare, had a stark set of numbers to illustrate the demand: “Our video visit program has skyrocketed. We went from 20 video visits in all of February to more than 5,300 visits since last Monday!” The E-visits function of Bon Secours Mercy Health, a longstanding but ignored option, is expanding now because people are using it more, said system spokeswoman Nanette Bentley. For nine days in mid-March compared to the last 12 months, call volume is up 28%, reaching almost
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Specht pulls up the application on her phone that she uses for telemedicine doctor visits.
one-third of 2019 telehealth use, Bentley said. In one day, the system is seeing what would usually be two weeks' volume. On March 23 call volume was 87% higher than on March 20, she said. Telemedicine visits are free if related to the novel coronavirus outbreak and the development of the respiratory illness COVID-19. While Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield was not able to share numbers, spokesman Jeff Blunt said the insurer is seeing a rise in medical and behavioral claims through its telehealth provider, LiveHealth Online. The insurer now is waiving member cost share for telehealth visits. “Anthem is encouraging members to use telehealth when possible as it reduces the burden on the health care system and prevents spreading a virus while waiting with others at a physical facility,” Blunt said. The Cincinnati Children’s Center for Telehealth is averaging more than 500 telehealth visits a day, said Shannon Kettler, spokeswoman for Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. The usual daily average is 20. The hospital has set up a free telehealth option called CincyKids Health Connect for parents in Ohio and Kentucky worried that a child is showing symptoms of COVID-19. Children as young as infants have tested positive in Ohio for the illness. Dr. Bryan Strader, physician executive of TriHealth Physician Partners and system chief of inpatient medicine, said patients had reported uncertainty about keeping appointments with primary care doctors during the pandemic. But he said, "We made a big push to encourage our physicians not to cancel regularly scheduled business from patients that are well and others that See TELEMEDICINE, Page 2A
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Concerts and sporting events have stopped but not the construction of the two music venues along the Ohio River and FC Cincinnati’s stadium. Despite the pandemic, county offi cials and developers said construction both projects are still ongoing, as is the apartment complex at Fourth and Race streets. Construction is considered an essential business and exempt from the orders from Ohio and Kentucky’s governors. The music venues being built across from each other on the riverfronts of Newport and Cincinnati are neck-and-neck in terms of progress. The builders hope to open the $27 million venue, dubbed the Andrew J. Brady ICON Music Center, in the shadow of Paul Brown Stadium sometime late fall. Newport’s $23 million music venue, Ovation Pavilion, is targeted March 2021 to open on the long-awaited Ovation property at the confl uence of the Licking and Ohio rivers. Competition among the venues is expected to be fi erce, with the Cincinnati one being built by the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra’s music promotion wing, Music and Events Management, Inc.(MEMI), and the Newport one being built by Columbus-based PromoWest. They’re roughly the same size and both have indoor and outdoor stages. The ICON music center will fi t 4,500 people indoors and 8,000 outdoors. Ovation Pavilion will have room for 2,800 indoors and 7,000 outdoors. The concrete for the fi rst-level fl oors where concertgoers will stand have been poured for both venues. In fact, the fl oor of the fi rst level of the music venue at The Banks by Paul Brown Stadium was scheduled to be fi nished Wednesday, March 25, said Mike Smith, president of MEMI. “If you were to go down there and you were to stand on that slab, that is where patrons would stand on the fi rst level looking at the stage,” Smith said. Smith wouldn’t say a specifi c month they plan on opening. The CSO’s venue is already fi nanced thanks to some large, anonymous donations, Smith said. The garages underneath both concert halls are still under construction. See CONSTRUCTION, Page 2A
Construction crews work on the new music venue that's part of Ovation development in Newport. It will include parking, an indoor and outdoor music venue and at least two hotels. It will be in view of Cincinnati's music venue that will be next to Paul Brown Stadium. The Kentucky venue to will run by AEG and open in late 2020. LIZ DUFOUR/CINCINNATI ENQUIRER
Vol. 23 No. 16 © 2020 The Community Recorder ALL RIGHTS RESERVED $1.00
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