Providing Specialized Nursing Care for the Littlest Patients

The birth of a child is a moment that changes everything in the best possible way. But when that baby comes early or is critically ill, those first few hours look nothing like the picture-perfect moment anyone expected. Instead of quiet bonding in their room on the floor, the baby is whisked away to be surrounded by monitors, tubes, and teams of specialists working with urgency and precision.

In these environments, Virtual Nursing is emerging as an important layer of support for care teams and families navigating the complex world of neonatal intensive care.

Carrying the Weight

A Level IV NICU, the highest level of Neonatal Intensive Care Units (NICUs), is a busy, demanding and complex environment. Doctors and nurses manage multiple critically ill patients simultaneously, coordinating with specialists, social workers, and families, while tackling a mountain of documentation, care planning and constant clinical monitoring. Babies need support from dedicated teams around the clock. The emotional weight for both caregivers and families is crushing.

At The Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) in Charleston, that level of care is amplified. MUSC welcomes more than 2,000 babies a year, and its NICU admits over 900 infants, both those born at MUSC and transferred from surrounding hospitals. As a designated regional perinatal center, MUSC Children’s supports families across South Carolina through expert advice, telemedicine consultations, on-site education, and, when necessary, transfers to higher levels of care.

What sets MUSC apart is its philosophy of partnership. The NICU team actively encourages parents to become engaged participants in their baby’s care, helping them understand the science and the motivation behind every decision. This integration of evidence-based medicine, interdisciplinary teamwork, and family-centered care has established MUSC Children’s Hospital as the premier provider for high-risk neonates in the region.

Now, alongside the bedside teams and the families they serve, a new partner has joined the NICU: VirtuAlly.

Welcome to the Crib

VirtuAlly’s Virtual Nurses or VRNs are experienced clinicians who have received advanced training in “webside manner.” They work remotely alongside bedside teams to handle tasks that may otherwise pull nurses away.

In MUSC’s Level IV NICU, our VRNs allow physicians and nurses to focus on the patient rather than the paperwork. We extend the capacity of the care teams throughout six key clinical and administrative functions:

• Real-time bedside collaboration: Support safety education and initiatives with the onsite team
• Discharge education: Delivering structured family education for continuity of care and reducing preventable readmissions
• Documentation and care coordination: Managing documentation workflows and lessening administrative burdens on the bedside staff
• Family Orientation: Educating families when their children are admitted to the NICU about what to expect and how they play an essential role in their child’s care
• Enhanced family education and communication: Continuing education for families as the needs of their babies change, allowing for informed care and decision making
• Translation and Language Support: Ensuring clinical educational access regardless of language or communication barriers

“The NICU setting demands precision and constant coordination as our team cares for the most fragile patients in the hospital,” said Emily Warr, MSN, RN, Administrator for the MUSC Center for Telehealth and former NICU nurse. “We’ve seen the demonstrated positive impact of VirtuAlly’s pediatric virtual nurses in the med-surg units of our children’s hospital, and their expertise and collaborative engagement style make them a trusted extension of our care team. Bringing the VirtuAlly partnership into the NICU strengthens our nursing coverage effectiveness, streamlines team-based nursing workflows for added efficiency, and helps ensure our newborns receive the highest level of care in the critical first days of their lives.”

MUSC’s NICU partnership is not VirtuAlly’s first foray into women and children’s healthcare. Instead, it is really a natural progression. Our VRNs are already embedded in pediatric spaces, including at MUSC’s own Shawn Jenkins Children’s Hospital. There, we support medical-surgical pediatric units and both acute- and chronic-care populations. This solid foundation makes VirtuAlly’s support in NICUs a logical choice, and we are excited about what’s to come.

Supporting Families Through Virtual Nursing

For families, Virtual Nurses are a lifeline of education, while bedside nurses offer human presence. VRNs ensure parents have a calm, compassionate, and culturally responsive ally to help them understand what is happening with their babies, what they can expect and how they are a vital part of their baby’s care, and help them navigate the NICU environment.

It’s part of the VRN training, understanding the science and clinical realities of the NICU while also offering support for the raw emotions and human side. They meet these families where they are.

When it’s time for babies to head home, VRNs use structured techniques to guide families through complex care plans, ensuring parents feel genuinely confident before they leave. That preparation matters: families who leave the NICU well-educated are less likely to return for preventable reasons, which is better for the baby, the family, and the healthcare system.

The NICU will always be a place of urgency and intensity. With the right support, it can also be a place where families feel seen, informed, and ready, while bedside teams can focus on the tiny patient in the room.

The NICU Looks to the Future

The NICU is unique in the hospital. Tiny, vulnerable patients whose status may change in a moment, caregivers dealing with relentless clinical demands, and families who are overwhelmed.  Precision is not optional. Compassion is not a luxury. It requires an entire team working together.

Virtual nursing gives patients, caregivers, and families another valuable member of the team. For newborns, it means an added layer of vigilance supporting their safety during the most fragile days of their lives. For families, it means a consistent educational presence that helps them move from fear to confidence, finally leaving the NICU ready to care for their child. For bedside nurses, it offers relief from relentless administrative and educational paperwork, reducing burnout and allowing them to do what they love: care for patients.

Virtual nursing is reshaping women’s and children’s healthcare at MUSC and across the country, becoming standard practice. The smallest patients deserve the largest support. Virtual nursing helps make that possible.

How One Health System’s Phased Approach Demonstrated the Benefits of Virtual Nursing 

When bedside nurses are stretched thin, virtual nursing can help relieve pressure while improving patient care. One South Carolina health system recognized this challenge and set out to explore a new way to support both nurses and patients—without adding burden to already full teams. 

Together, we launched a pilot program that introduced virtual nurses (VRNs) from VirtuAlly into care teams across four adult medical-surgical units within the system. The goal was simple: provide meaningful support to bedside nurses while improving the overall patient experience. 

The pilot ran from October 2023 through March 2024, and the results spoke for themselves. 

Four Units. Real-World Experience. 

By implementing the pilot across four hospitals throughout South Carolina, we were able to see how virtual nursing worked in varied care environments—each with its own workflows, challenges, and patient needs. 

This approach allowed us to adapt the model in real time, ensuring virtual nursing support met each unit where it was and complemented existing care teams rather than disrupting them. 

A Flexible Model Designed Around Care Teams 

Using a flexible model, we established a centralized command center alongside remote, work-from-home virtual nurses who partnered closely with in-hospital staff. Units onboarded VRN services on a rolling schedule, allowing support to scale as needed. 

We focused on tasks that most often pull bedside nurses away from direct patient care, including: 

• Patient admissions and discharges 

• Care plan review and documentation 

• Patient education and discharge readiness 

• Quality surveillance and documentation compliance 

Because our virtual nurses could flex coverage across multiple units, support was available when teams needed it most—without adding strain to bedside staff. 

How Virtual Nursing Supports Bedside Teams

Over 5.5 months, virtual nurses became a steady layer of support across the participating units: 

• 1,550 patients supported 

• More than 800 admissions handled by VRNs 

• 25.1 days returned to bedside nurses, giving them more time to focus on patient care 

• Patient throughput increased by more than 35.3%, improving timely discharges across all sites 

• Documentation compliance increased by up to 11.7% at two pilot hospitals 

• Quality metrics improved, reinforcing the role of virtual nurses in delivering consistent, safe care 

With this additional support in place, patients moved through the system more efficiently—even during peak census periods—and bedside nurses were able to focus on what matters most. 

Virtual nurses became true partners and allies in care delivery. 

Patients Felt the Difference 

Patients noticed the impact of this added support. Across all four pilot sites, HCAHPS discharge information scores increased by as much as 10%, reflecting improved nurse engagement during the discharge process. 

Patients reported feeling: 

• Better informed 

• More cared for throughout their hospital stay 

These experiences can contribute to stronger outcomes—both during hospitalization and beyond. 

A Scalable Solution for the Future of Care 

This pilot program demonstrated how technology-enabled bedside nursing can provide meaningful, sustainable support for care teams—helping address workforce shortages while easing day-to-day pressure on nurses. 

By standing alongside bedside teams, virtual nursing offers a scalable operational solution that improves care delivery today and helps health systems prepare for what’s ahead. 

At VirtuAlly, we believe care teams shouldn’t have to carry the load alone—and this pilot shows what’s possible when they have virtual allies on their side. 

Partnership with MUSC brings virtual nursing to South Carolina’s highest-acuity NICU. 

CHARLESTON, SC – Feb. 10, 2026 – VirtuAlly, a national leader in virtual nursing (VRN) and clinical support services, is expanding its specialty care model to a new and highly complex patient population: critically ill and premature newborns. Beginning in January, VirtuAlly’s experienced VRNs joined the care team in the Level IV Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) regarding NICU virtual nursing — the state’s only Level IV NICU, the highest designation for neonatal care.

The collaboration underscores VirtuAlly’s role as a national leader in NICU virtual nursing, bringing specialized clinical expertise that expands staffing capacity, improves workflows, and elevates care for critically ill newborns and their families. 

A specialty virtual nursing team for a specialty environment 

VirtuAlly’s nurses are highly trained clinicians with an average of 13 years of experience. Through NICU virtual nursing, they focus on strengthening clinical coverage and supporting bedside teams through:

• Real‑time collaboration with bedside team to support safety education & initiatives 

• Discharge education (to support reduction of readmissions) 

• Documentation and care coordination 

• Orientation support for families 

• Enhanced family education and communication 

• Translation and language support 

By integrating into MUSC’s care model, VirtuAlly’s VRNs broaden the impact of the bedside clinicians, enabling frontline teams to focus on direct patient care. 

Supporting families and easing administrative complexity 

“NICU care is complex on every level — medically, operationally, and administratively,” said Angel Bozard, Chief Nursing Officer at VirtuAlly. “Beyond continuous clinical attention, caring for these neonates often means coordinating communication across large care teams — including social workers and families — while navigating intensive patient‑education needs. Our virtual nursing model helps manage those layers of complexity so bedside nurses can stay focused on delivering exceptional, compassionate care to newborns and their families.” 

Building on their deep clinical expertise, VRNs receive advanced training in “webside manner,” ensuring that every interaction with families is clear, compassionate, and culturally responsive. Their expertise in patient education includes structured teach‑back techniques that help families understand complex care plans and feel confident caring for their newborns at home, a critical factor in reducing preventable readmissions. VRNs also provide multilingual communication support, helping bridge language barriers that can complicate care for families navigating the NICU environment. 

A trusted partner in one of the hospital’s most demanding environments 

“The NICU setting demands precision and constant coordination as our team cares for the most fragile patients in the hospital,” said Emily Warr, MSN, RN, Administrator for the MUSC Center for Telehealth and former NICU nurse. “We’ve seen the demonstrated positive impact of VirtuAlly’s pediatric virtual nurses in the med-surg units of our children’s hospital, and their expertise and collaborative engagement style make them a trusted extension of our care team. Bringing the VirtuAlly partnership into the NICU strengthens our nursing coverage effectiveness, streamlines team-based nursing workflows for added efficiency, and helps ensure our newborns receive the highest level of care in the critical first days of their lives.” 

Building on a proven pediatric foundation 

VirtuAlly’s expansion into neonatal care builds on its established success supporting pediatric hospital units, and a nationwide strategy for women’s and children’s care. ViruAlly’s VRNs currently serve in Shawn Jenkins’ medical-surgical unit as well as the mother baby population in women’s and children’s supporting acute and chronic care patients and staff. medical-surgical pediatric units, supporting acute and chronic care patients and staff. The company’s VRNs have supported more than 3,000 admissions and discharges, helping improve care delivery, documentation accuracy, and family communication. 

“Over the past year, our pediatric virtual nursing program has proven what’s possible when highly trained clinicians are integrated seamlessly into hospital care teams,” said Joe Wechsler, CEO of VirtuAlly. “That success laid the foundation for our expansion into the NICU, where the need for precision, coordination, and family support is even greater. We believe virtual nurses will become the standard of care in modern healthcare, and this partnership with MUSC is a powerful step toward that future.” 

 

 

About MUSC
The Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) is South Carolina’s only comprehensive academic health system, dedicated to advancing health through education, research, and patient care. Based in Charleston, MUSC includes a nationally recognized academic medical center, a robust clinical enterprise, and a statewide network of hospitals and physician practices. MUSC is committed to improving the health of all South Carolinians through innovative care delivery, leading-edge research, and training the next generation of healthcare professionals. 

The Widening Gap: Patient Acuity & Hospital Pressures

Hospitals today are under significant pressure from staffing shortages, rising costs, and increasing patient acuity. According to the American Nurses Foundation, workforce shortages are straining healthcare access and quality: 56% of nurses report burnout, 39% say they expect to leave their job soon, and over half say their units lack qualified RNs, undermining the delivery of high-quality care. At the same time, rising costs are creating financial instability, pressuring hospitals to do more with fewer resources, while increasing patient acuity further intensifies these issues by demanding more expertise. Combined, these challenges widen the gap between the care patients need and what hospitals are able to provide.

Addressing the Critical Gap

Addressing this gap is critical for both the health system and the patient. Virtual nursing and telesitting closes this widening gap by extending skilled clinical support right where hospitals feel the most strain—at the bedside, in real time, and without adding pressure to already overburdened teams.

This is done by investing in adjunct teams of experienced nurses and trained safety observers, giving hospitals continuous observation and reliable support that enhances both safety and efficiency. Together, these solutions are restoring valuable time to clinicians, strengthening care coordination, and ensuring patients receive the attention their acuity demands, narrowing the gap between what hospitals are expected to deliver and what their current staff and resources can realistically support. Virtual care provides critical support to both tertiary and rural healthcare settings.

Virtual Nursing and Telesitting: What’s the Difference?

VirtuAlly delivers targeted, tech-enabled solutions to support clinical teams where they need it most. Whether your organization needs experienced nurses providing remote clinical support, patient education, and discharge coordination to improve efficiency and patient outcomes, or you need scalable, real-time patient monitoring command center to reduce falls, enhance safety, and cut sitter costs, each model provides value and a distinct solution for your institution. Let’s break them down.

Virtual Nursing: Extending the Impact of Your Bedside Team

Virtual nursing offers experienced nurses who provide remote clinical support, patient education, and discharge coordination. Expanding the reach of clinical care without exhaustive on-site teams and the burden of space, hospitals can deliver high-quality care more efficiently and cost-effectively.

This is a solution to care that offers:

• Less professional burnout
• Improving admission workflow
• Nurse-to-nurse support
• Flexibility care models
• Patient satisfaction

Virtual nursing provides measurable results, as it

• Returns approximately 120 minutes to bedside nurses each shift
• Boosts nursing engagement by 42%
• Speeds up patient discharge by 32%

Adding virtual nursing to your institution enhances operational efficiency, strengthens clinical workforce, and elevates the patient experience.

Telesitting from VirtuAlly: Allies in Service, Partners in Purpose

Through scalable, real-time patient monitoring, our observers foster safe, supportive, and nurturing environments for patients and nurses. Telesitting is designed to address a comprehensive list of safety concerns including fall risk, moderate and low suicidal ideation, and safety for seniors in a variety of inpatient settings.

Our tailored care approach provides:

• Advanced patient safety
• Dedicated 24/7 observation
• Reduction in workplace violence events
• Fall prevention

VirtuAlly’s proven telesitting results bring:

• Average savings of $150k per unit
• Potential 90% reduction in 1:1 sitter costs
• 50-70% decrease in patient falls per facility

Integrating telesitting into your care model strengthens patient safety, protects your staff, and optimizes resources.

Integrating Virtual Nurses Into Clinical Operations

Virtual nursing is designed to enhance the current clinical operations and workflows.

Empowering nurses and patients alike, virtual nursing takes a significant burden away from hospital staff. As an extension of the bedside team, virtual nurses specialize in patient care through administrative tasks, quality surveillance and education.

Easing the pressure in hospitals, bedside nurses are able to focus on hands-on patient care, without the stress—giving them more time and more presence to deliver the compassionate, connected care that these patients need.

Our virtual nurses bring a depth of expertise to every interaction, with an average of 13 years of bedside experience guiding their care. Their seasoned judgment ensures that patients receive informed, compassionate support that blends years of clinical bedside wisdom with virtual precision and the human touch.

Better Patient Outcomes

Virtual nurses ensure that all details of clinical support, education and discharge are handled. By offloading high-volume, time-consuming tasks, virtual nurses free bedside staff to give their full attention to the hands-on care only they can provide. Additionally, they are able to prioritize the patient’s emotional needs.

As patient outcomes improve, health systems experience a wide range of clinical, operational, financial, and reputational benefits.

A More Resilient Healthcare System

Hospitals gain built-in flexibility, operational stability, and clinical consistency when nursing capacity is expanded utilizing virtual nursing and telesitting.

This expanded capacity translates into meaningful improvements across the entire system. Additionally, it fortifies a hospital’s ability to absorb pressure, adapt, as well as maintain high-quality care despite workforce shortages, unpredictable demand, and rising patient acuity.

When health systems are stronger, the impact is felt by all: patients, nurses, and entire hospital teams.

Options to Meet Your Needs

Following our seamless process, we offer three distinct options for continued care from our team. Each option gives you direct access to collaboratively plan and implement your workflow.

Complete Staffing Solution

Our bespoke services offer continuous, 24/7 virtual monitoring with complete resources. Around the clock, our virtual nurses and virtual safety observers deliver both virtual nursing and telesitting staffing support.

Our implementation team works collaboratively to design workflows that make the transition seamless. We offer periodic training and regular strategy sessions to build your team’s confidence and proficiency with the technology.

Flexible Staffing Model

Our flexible staffing model allows healthcare organizations to customize how our care team extends to effectively support theirs. This approach can provide partial or temporary support helping you scale where it is needed most.

Consulting Expertise

Our consulting expertise empowers your team to leverage our strategic guidance to strengthen your organization. We specifically provide consultation around technology, data, and virtual workflow integration. Through our strategic guidance, we offer a variety of resources.

We bring deep experience in virtual nursing and telesitting, and use that for hiring and training support for on-premise or virtual staff. We collaborate with your team to refine your workflow, ensuring the technology is integrated smoothly into your team’s processes and systems.

How Health Systems Partner with VirtuAlly

Our Three Step Process

Discover

By evaluating your current clinical operations, workflow, and technology, we identify where virtual support can create the greatest impact and enhance the patient and care team’s experience. Together, we design a solution that works within and compliments your existing system.

Design

In collaboration with your team, we develop additional protocols and virtual workflows, test your technology, guide your staff, and define the scope of work to ensure success. Every improvement is designed to strengthen safety, reduce variation between systems, and improve outcomes, so your team can focus on what matters most: bedside patient care.

Additionally, while we are not technology agnostic, we work with a wide variety of top tier technology parters that we have vetted. This means that we will make technology recommendations that best suit your needs.

Deploy

Our team works to seamlessly deploy our virtual services through a comprehensive and collaborative implementation process.

Key Outcomes Hospitals Can Expect

Stronger Teams. Better Care. Real Results.

As a Joint Commission accredited team, VirtuAlly helps you to turn your virtual care vision into reality. With proven processes, flexible service models, and commitment to collaboration, we empower and support healthcare systems through virtual caring solutions.

Because when nurses are supported, patients can feel it. When hospitals run more efficiently, outcomes improve. And when technology strengthens a system combined with remote patient observation adding connection at every step of the way…everyone wins.

Together, through virtual nursing and telesitting, VirtuAlly can transform care delivery and elevate the standard of healthcare for every patient, in any healthcare setting.

Discover how VirtuAlly’s pediatric virtual nursing model relies on our team of experts, delivering safety, trust, and compassion for the youngest of patients. 

Small Patients. Big Responsibility. 

Every child deserves care that’s grounded in compassion — whether the nurse is standing at the bedside or connecting through a screen.  

As one of only a few telehealth organizations specializing in virtual nursing care for children, VirtuAlly’s Pediatric team is comprised of highly trained pediatric nurses with an average of 13 years of experience. These professionals understand the complex needs of pediatric patients and bring the clinical precision and empathy required to care for children and support the bedside team.  

This year, as we reach the one-year-mark of our pediatric virtual nursing division, we want to peel back the curtain on the way our virtual allies collaborate to extend the work of bedside teams.  

Why Pediatric Virtual Nursing Matters 

Good practitioners know that pediatric care requires a different approach entirely. It’s not “do the same as the adult, only in miniature.” It requires specialization, emotional intelligence, family communication, and trust. At VirtuAlly, our pediatric virtual nursing model operates under a few basic principles:  

Experience at Scale 

To date, our team has conducted over 1500 admissions and discharges in pediatric hospitals, improving care outcomes across the board. 

Culture of Support 

We empower bedside teams to focus on the young patients before them rather than feeling the burden of being a taskmaster. By supporting their quality initiatives and helping them achieve key metric goals, we enhance the overall standard of care. Our specialized skill set allows us to partner directly at the bedside, ensuring excellence when pediatric patients receive care outside traditional pediatric settings. Together, our teams can confidently deliver quality pediatric care right where it’s needed most. 

Empathy and Precision 

With each case, we utilize our team’s Unrivaled Virtual Caring –  unique empathy and communication skills to ensure these youngest patients are safely cared for with Unmatched Expertise and compassion. 

The Ripple Effect: How Pediatric Virtual Nursing Benefits Everyone 

Unmatched experience, support, empathy and precision establish better outcomes for families, hospitals, and nurses alike.  

When Pediatric Nursing Works, Everyone Wins.  

These outcomes strengthen relationships and deepen trust with families, effectively representing the hospital’s virtual care strategy.  

For hospitals, virtual nursing supports scalable staffing that enhances safety metrics. By optimizing resources, this strategy ensures that the right number of nurses and specialists are where they are needed most.  

Flexibility for nurses fosters empowerment, giving them the ability to engage in purpose-driven work.  

In short, it’s a win-win-win—providing a measurable impact on telehealth ROI in pediatrics.  

Extending Pediatric Expertise Beyond Children’s Hospitals 

More often than not, you bring your child to the hospital closest to you. In times of uncertainty and stress, the best situation is to have a pediatric nurse care for your child. What happens in a rural setting? What about when there is no pediatric nurse available? Transfers, more stress, and delayed care.  

But not with VirtuAlly. With our pediatric virtual nursing team, your child gains access to care almost immediately. By bridging the gap between children’s hospitals and community settings, pediatric virtual nurses collaborate with bedside staff in real time. This enhances your child’s care by guiding clinical decision-making and preventing unnecessary transfers.  

Simply put, your child receives great treatment—saving time, reducing stress for families, and keeping care close to home.  

Real Stories, Real Impact: Safety, Language, and Connection 

Recently, a 2-month-old infant was admitted by his grandmother, who only spoke Spanish. His parents were out of state at that time, so interpreter services were consulted to assist in the admission process. When the grandmother wasn’t able to provide the correct information during the admission assessment, a VirtuAlly VRN contacted the bedside team to ensure the child’s safety, protection, and accuracy of records. 

According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, nearly 15% of children live in non-English speaking households. This situation was a powerful reminder of how essential communication and teamwork are in delivering safe, high-quality care — no matter the circumstances or language barriers. 

Behind the Screens: Collaboration that Elevates Care 

Since adding our Women’s and Children’s Coordinator to the team, our focus has expanded to enhance coordinated pediatric care and emphasize digital patient safety.   

Let’s reimagine pediatric virtual care – together. Connect with our team today to explore how a VirtuAlly partnership can keep your youngest patients safe, supported, and close to home. 

Healthcare is in critical condition.

With increasing caseloads, rising costs, workforce shortages, and uncertain funding, healthcare is straining under pressure. Medical systems are asked to do more with less, and professionals are looking for smarter, scalable, sustainable solutions. Virtual Nursing is opening possibilities that seemed unfathomable even a decade ago.

Nursing care that is both present and remote.

At VirtuAlly, our Virtual Nursing model is a proven strategy for better patient outcomes, a more empowered team, and more resilient healthcare systems.

Virtual Nursing expands the reach of clinical care without expanding physical space or exhausting on-site teams. It’s a model that improves patient outcomes, supports bedside staff, and adds critical flexibility to care delivery while remaining cost-effective.

It is critical care for an industry in crisis.

Despite growing market demand, many healthcare systems hesitate to move forward because they fear the programmatic lift, staffing, and costs.

They shouldn’t.

It has been estimated that 74% of hospital leaders believe that virtual workflows are the future, but only 10% have enabled them into care delivery.

Let’s demystify the process. At VirtuAlly, we guide organizations through what we call the Crawl, Walk, Run model of implementation.

Crawl Stage: Is it a “Good Idea Whose Time has Come”? 

The crawl stage is filled with curiosity and hesitation. The Virtual Nursing concepts and the benefits have piqued your interest, but the unknowns loom large.

The how. The when. The whom.

The journey from idea to launch begins with a few common but crucial questions:

Do we have the tech we need?
What model is right for us?
Where will we find the proper support?

These questions are part of what VirtuAlly identifies as the Crawl Stage.

Your purpose will define your why.

Identify the problems you are trying to solve. Are you looking to ease staffing shortages? Is your aim to streamline admissions and discharges or enhance bedside care?

We can help you find your why, and once established, it becomes much easier to define your goals.

Prioritizing tangible KPIs to your “why” is a great place to start. VirtuAlly starts with an on-site needs assessment, using a tool to help organizations answer many of these important questions. We examine your technology, workflows, patient volumes, and clinical goals. Then we define the right parameters to not just meet your goals but to exceed them.

What do we mean by parameters?

One of the first decisions you will face is a big one: should you build the program with existing staff or bring in outside help?

Both have pros and cons.

In-house professionals are familiar with your systems, procedures, and organizational culture. Staffing and scheduling may present a challenge: If nurses remain on-site, the line between virtual and on-site could blur, making it far easier for VRNs to be pulled back to the bedside and lose the separation between virtual workflows and traditional habits.

A Staffing Solution brings a fresh perspective and process discipline. These professionals come online with the protocol faster and there is far less temptation to revert to old habits. However, the perception is they are costly. Bedside staff tend to see the virtual nurse as a net new resource instead of pulling from the depleted pool of existing staff. The reality is that our VRNs serve as an extension of your nursing team, often costing less than contract labor.

What about a little bit of both? The Hybrid Model

A Hybrid approach, at least initially, has a proven track record. The most resilient programs often start with a staffing solution to build structure and culture and then move slowly to an internal team. A hybrid model offers flexibility and scalability while preserving long-term ownership.

The crawl stage is about charting the course. The goal of the crawl stage isn’t speed. It is meant to be a crawl, but with clarity and alignment to set your organization up for success.

Taking the Next Steps: The Walk Stage

Once your model is chosen and your plan is in place, implementation begins. With VirtuAlly all of your progress and process is formatted to your specific requirements.

The Walk Stage is where ideas are tested in the real world. Technology is deployed. Teams are trained. Roles are refined. Collaboration – and walking hand in hand with your bedside team – begins.

Implementation Isn’t Linear

The walking stage requires collaboration to build trust and programmatic stability. You may need to refine roles, evaluating what’s working and what isn’t and getting comfortable with some ambiguity.

The Walk Stage is when you can see if the choices you made during Crawl are happening in stride.

Is on or off-site better for your environment?

Does technology work the way it should?

Are processes and procedures effective?

In this stage, it’s easy to fall back into old habits. When things get hard, systems default to the familiar. If the VRN’s are in-house, are they being pulled to the floor? Without structure, metrics, and a clearly defined role for VRNs, virtual nursing will not function as effectively as it should or scale as quickly as you may desire.

What can you do to keep moving forward and find success with Virtual Nursing?

Measuring What Matters

Start identifying and tracking KPIs

– Average time from admission to discharge
– Patient satisfaction
– Staff engagement and retention
– Workflow efficiency
– Cost per interaction

Good data leads to good decisions which foster growth and builds your case for scaling.

Case in Point: Expansion Time

One of VirtuAlly’s clients (let’s call them Westside Medical – a single hospital system) entered phase two of their VRN Pilot, expanding by two to three units per month per region across their service area.  

The Virtual Nursing Model deployed was for VRNs to support only the admission, discharge and quality compliance processes, with a goal of giving bedside nurses quality time with patients.  

The results? An average of 120 minutes per shift was saved in documentation in the EMR. With a clear roadmap from VirtuAlly, thoughtful implementation, and consistent support, they saw faster discharge times, higher nurse and patient satisfaction, and measurable drops in burnout. (In general, organizations using our services see an average of 47% improvement in nurse retention, too!)  

Smart decisions, real data, and forward motion. That’s the Walk.

First, We Crawl. Then, We Walk. Now, We Run: The Run Stage

You’ve hit your stride. Admissions and discharges are running smoothly. Your Virtual Nurses have become integral to the healthcare system. The numbers are there. Management is supportive.

VirtuAlly stands with you providing ongoing support to ensure your VRN continues running at its best.

Many organizations, both big and small, would like to do more, but they remain uncertain how to scale. Even large institutions may have only one virtual nursing pilot program and want to expand while small facilities may feel the next steps aren’t feasible for a hospital of their size.

Big or small, it is possible.

VirtuAlly provides the roadmap for what is working well and how to scale it no matter the size of the facility or system.

As we scale, we may return to walking and even crawling as the technological infrastructure, staffing and protocols are established or expanded but always in alignment with the purposes and goals you established when you first started to crawl.

Let’s begin.

For healthcare systems, establishing virtual nursing isn’t a sprint. It’s a strategic evolution. With VirtuAlly, you can take a crawl-walk-run approach that meets your organization where it is, aligns with your staffing goals, and delivers measurable impact along the way. Whether you’re just exploring or ready to scale, we’re here to guide you with proven frameworks, experienced partners, and technology that puts providers, nurses and patients first. VirtuAlly invites your organization to partner for progress, allowing us to support you through every stage of the Virtual Nursing Journey.

No matter where you fall, we have a simple, seamless, three-step deployment process to get your virtual caring team up and running.

Reach out today to see what VirtuAlly can do for your team.

– Teledigm Health and VirtuAlly are committed to delivering comprehensive virtual nursing solutions to rural facilities across the Midwest.

– The continuing nursing shortage in the United States is especially impacting rural healthcare systems.

CHARLESTON, S.C. and LINCOLN, NE – May 14, 2025 – Rural residents across the United States face serious healthcare challenges, including limited access to providers. To address this pressing need, VirtuAlly and Teledigm Health entered into a collaborative agreement to bring virtual nursing services to rural healthcare systems and critical access hospitals Teledigm serves.

Rural healthcare providers face critical staffing shortages, especially among registered nurses, as fewer than 20% reside in rural areas. This gap limits patients’ access to the quality care they deserve. VirtuAlly’s virtual nurses support the onsite care team and enable rural health systems to reduce costs, boost efficiency and improve patient outcomes. Through the Teledigm partnership, VirtuAlly’s always-on virtual nursing services will support partner hospital systems across the Midwest by elevating the RN skill set to better assist critical care patients, with an average reduction of 20% in nurse turnover. Virtual nurses allow on-site nurses to focus on direct patient needs and critical tasks, further alleviating the administrative burden.

“Recruiting and retaining nurses in rural areas has become a significant challenge for healthcare systems across these communities. The partnership between VirtuAlly and Teledigm will address this critical need. Everyone deserves access to quality care — no matter where they live,” VirtuAlly Chief Nursing Officer Angel Bozard said. “Our virtual nurses seamlessly support rural healthcare systems and ensure patients receive the care they need and deserve, all while providing the on-site staff with the critical support to focus on bedside tasks.”

Rural facilities facing staff shortages must often transfer patients to other hospitals for treatment. Access to virtual nurses with critical care expertise will provide these rural hospital systems with a support system that will allow patients to remain close to home.

“Rural hospitals are confronted with many unique challenges. Partnering with VirtuAlly allows us to bring virtual nursing services to the rural systems we serve, and ensure their staff has the support and expertise they need to meet the demands of patient care,” Shane Fleming, Cofounder and Chief Development Officer at Teledigm Health said. “VirtuAlly is a company that perfectly aligns with our mission and vision.  We look forward to working together and addressing healthcare needs in rural America.”

Teledigm and VirtuAlly share a commitment to patient-centered care by integrating the human touch with technology. The companies aim to leverage technology to enhance patient care, improve accessibility, and adapt to the evolving needs of the healthcare industry, all while maintaining a strong emphasis on human-centered approaches.

“To date, large, academic systems have been the primary beneficiary of virtual nursing. The collaboration with Teledigm will provide rural hospital settings with the same efficiencies and capabilities larger,” Bozard continued. “With always-on virtual care, we help short-staffed health systems focus on urgent needs while providing patients with peace of mind and continuous support.”

About Teledigm

Teledigm Health is a leading provider of sustainable telemedicine solutions, enabling communities to thrive through enhanced healthcare access. Founded by clinicians in 2014, the company delivers over 40 specialized service lines to more than 80 facilities in 12 states. By seamlessly integrating into existing workflows, Teledigm Health provides cost-effective access to board-certified specialists for emergency, acute, and scheduled consultations. Their expertise empowers healthcare facilities to optimize patient care delivery, improve profitability, and overcome the challenges of resource constraints. Teledigm Health recognizes the challenges facing healthcare facilities of all sizes and is dedicated to providing innovative solutions that help their communities thrive by providing the best possible care for their patients, regardless of their location. For more information: teledigmhealth.com

 

Media Contacts

Alex Keown

Inspire Agency on behalf of VirtuAlly

[email protected]

630-346-5141

Andy Whitney

Director of Marketing and Analytics, Teledigm Health
[email protected]
531-350-6969

CHARLESTON, S.C. – Jan. 15, 2025 – Virtual nursing and telesitting company VirtuAlly received accreditation for telehealth services from The Joint Commission. This honor demonstrates the company’s continuous compliance with performance standards and commitment to providing safe and quality patient care.

“VirtuAlly is proud to boast that we have achieved the gold standard in healthcare: a Joint Commission accreditation for telehealth services,” said Mark Sturgess, VirtuAlly’s Quality Assurance Manager. “This objective, third-party analysis of our organization ensures that we are meeting or exceeding the most elaborate requirements in the industry and continuously finding ways to improve for our patients and our clients. We are among a small number of organizations nationwide that can claim telehealth accreditation.”

The Joint Commission launched this new accreditation in July of 2024. As a voluntary effort, VirtuAlly reached out to the Joint Commission and completed a pre-submit application. A surveyor from the Joint Commission evaluated VirtuAlly through a rigorous review process in December 2024 to ensure they were adhering to national and internal policies around standards of care, effective documentation, patient safety, and care quality.

“We consistently work to not only do things the right way, but strive for excellence,” said Joe Wechsler, VirtuAlly’s CEO. “Receiving this accreditation gives our clients and future partners confidence that we have and always will provide the best service possible. We are continuously raising the industry bar for innovative and effective virtual caring solutions and what it means to be an effective telehealth company.”

“As a healthcare accreditor, The Joint Commission works with healthcare organizations across care settings to inspire safer and higher quality of care that is more equitable and compassionate,” says Ken Grubbs, DNP, MBA, RN, executive vice president of Accreditation and Certification Operations and chief nursing officer, The Joint Commission. “Through collaborating on innovative solutions and evidence-based resources and tools, The Joint Commission helps drive improvement while maintaining accountability through our leading survey methods and standards. We commend VirtuAlly for its commitment to advance safety, quality, equity and compassion for all patients.”

The Joint Commission offers the industry’s most comprehensive framework to help organizations establish a consistent approach to virtual care. This respected Gold Seal of Approval® sets organizations apart and demonstrates that an organization provides quality care. The telehealth accreditation program was created for organizations that exclusively provide care, treatment and services via telehealth or remote patient monitoring. This accreditation is open to hospitals and other healthcare organizations that have written agreements in place to provide care, treatment and services via telehealth to another organization’s patients.

For more information on The Joint Commission, visit https://www.jointcommission.org/. To learn more about VirtuAlly’s industry-leading telehealth services, visit virtually.io.

CHARLESTON, SC – Sept. 30, 2024 – VirtuAlly, a leader in virtual nursing and virtual sitting, announced its planned participation and speaking at several upcoming conferences and industry events in the coming months, including:

AvaSure Symposium

October 2-4, 2024, Grand Rapids, MI

 

VirtuAlly will be presenting on “A Cohesive Approach: Use of an External Staffing Partner for Virtual Nursing Service Delivery.”

Presentation Description: This talk will explore the Medical University of South Carolina’s experience setting up a robust Virtual Nursing Program in conjunction with VirtuAlly. Presenters will explain how to choose an external partner and approach workflow development, communication, programmatic structure and data leveraging.

 

 

South Carolina Telehealth Summit

October 28-30, 2024, Hilton Head, SC

 

VirtuAlly in collaboration with MUSC’s Center for Telehealth will be presenting on “Design and Implementation of a Successful Virtual Nursing Program.”

 

 

American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC) Magnet Conference

October 30 – November 1, 2024, New Orleans, LA

 

VirtuAlly representatives will exhibit at this event.

Booth #: 2017

American Telehealth Association Virtual Nursing Insights Summit

November 17 – November 19, 2024, Arlington, TX

VirtuAlly will sponsor and present a case study on “The Measure of Success in Virtual Nursing.”

Did you know that 700,000 — 1,000,000 patients fall while hospitalized each year? Of those patients who fall, 30 — 35% sustain a serious injury that extends their hospital stay an average of six days. Moreover, patient falls may require rehabilitation and cause decline in the patient’s overall health and wellbeing.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), patient falls in hospitals are one of the most frequently reported adverse events. The issue is so pervasive that the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality published an extensive Preventing Patient Falls in Hospitals Toolkit.

Between 2018-2020, VirtuAlly monitored patient falls and associated costs before and after implementing our virtual monitoring system (VMS) in four units of a major hospital. The post-implementation results show a direct correlation between our VM implementation, patient harm reduction, and hospital cost reduction.

We’re proud of our partnerships. Which is why we must acknowledge our gratitude to the hospitals, long-term and post-acute care facilities who use our virtual patient monitoring system to identify and prevent safety risks.

Address the Root Causes of Hospital Patient Falls 

It is with the best of intentions that hospitals implement a fall prevention program. There are medication reviews, environmental modifications, clinician education, etc. Sadly, though, many hospitals still struggle to sustain their fall prevention program’s effectiveness long term. Why? We’ve called out the top six reasons.

1. Inadequate Risk Assessments: Identify hospital patients fall risk factors by conducting an accurate and comprehensive risk assessment of each patient and update it regularly. Otherwise, patients may be incorrectly identified as low risk, and create preventable, but harmful consequences.

2. Poor Communication and Teamwork: If there is a lack of communication or culture of teamwork, preventive measures may not be implemented in a timely, consistent, and appropriate manner. Checklists help standardize workflows. Regular team meetings and communication tools (i.e. Slack and TigerConnect) improve collaboration and trust. Even a refresher course in conflict resolution can offer options that promote productive, favorable outcomes.

3. Insufficient Staff Training: Staff should have working-knowledge on the assistive devices and technology their patients use, and a firm know how when it comes to positioning patients safely in beds, chairs, and other surfaces based on their individual needs and risk factors. If this is a vulnerability within your team, check out training in assistive products by the WHO.

4. Lack of Patient / Family Engagement: Encourage questions. Encourage patients to participate in exercises that improve strength, balance, and mobility. Additionally, provide family members with instructions on how to assist patients safely. The after-effect is motivated, proactive patients who ask for help, state their concerns upfront, use assistive devices and follow safety recommendations consistently.

5. Scarce Hospital Resources: You need technology, you need staff, and you need equipment. Together these resources form a cohesive, continuous fall prevention eco-system. VirtuAlly is the only telehealth company in the market that provides a full turnkey service for tele-sitting and virtual nursing by offering both technology and the staffing component. See for yourself why our virtual patient monitoring is an effective choice.

6. Failure to Collect and Analyze Patient Fall Data: With data, hospitals can identify trends, measure the impact of their interventions, and make well-informed decisions on how to adjust current strategies or future patient safety initiatives. For instance, data such as patient age, gender, medical history, circumstances surrounding a fall, and any resulting fall injuries should be recorded—and this is just the basics.

   Aside from electronic health records (EHRs), there are fall prevention assessment tools and data analytics software. Thank you, Pennsylvania Patient Safety Authority for your deep data dive in assessing patient safety and driving improvement.

Implementing Effective Patient Fall Prevention Programs in Your Hospital

Where can your hospital make improvements? Make a plan. And take action.

By implementing targeted interventions, monitoring progress, and sharing findings, your hospital can reduce the incidence of patient falls and improve patient safety overall.

Patient safety is the core of what we do. We say this often. That’s because we’ve witnessed the frustration from medical facilities trying to reduce patient falls. We’ve seen reduction at 25%. Yet one of our clients reported that 100% of their units with the VirtuAlly system installed saw decreases in patient falls post-installation, creating safer, happier environments for both patients and staff. A win, win. Win!

Patient safety in hospitals is everyone’s responsibility. So, if there’s an opportunity where you can reduce patient falls, we hope you act quickly. We also hope that you share this information with your staff and care teams.

As a reminder, our virtual patient monitoring solution is not just for hospitals. You can also find us in assisted living facilities where we support family members and care teams who are stretched thin when it comes to staffing.

Finally, we’re easy to reach. We’re likable and caring. We’d be delighted to demo how VirtuAlly.io elevates fall prevention programs to higher levels of effectiveness. We say this with confidence and gratitude.

The well-being and safety of every patient who enters one of our partner hospitals is prioritized. Below is an outline of the experience patients can expect.

Seamless Hospital Admission and Identifying At-Risk Behavior

The first phase is the patient’s hospital admission through the emergency department.

Secondly, the patient has specific risk indicators in EMR and begins to exhibit behavior that puts them at risk for self-harm. Our proactive approach to identifying patients who may be at risk for self-harm is what sets us apart. During this time, a nurse or physician identifies that this patient is an appropriate candidate for virtual monitoring when comparing the behaviors against the evidence-based algorithm.

Personalized Engagement and Unparalleled Patient Care

Third, the VirtuAlly solution is brought in to the patient’s room via mobile cart solution, TV, or wall mounted camera by a member of the on-site clinical team. Once the device is turned on, the Patient Safety Observer (PSO) introduces themselves to the patient as well as any family, visitors, or care team members currently in the room with the patient.

Vigilant Patient Monitoring and Proactive Intervention

Fourth, as the PSO monitors the patient throughout their shift, they observe any behavior that they qualify as at risk. When a patient begins to exhibit an at risk behavior, the PSO uses two-way audio-visual communication to redirect the patient’s behavior. If they are unable to redirect the patient’s behavior, the patient safety observer will escalate the call according to the escalation protocol put into place by the on-site care team as needed.

Celebrating Progress and Graduating to Independence

Last, as the patient’s condition improves and their risk behavior diminishes, the on-site care team along with our command center will check the intervention protocol algorithm and determine if the patient is eligible for discontinuation. If that patient is eligible for discontinuation, it indicates that they have graduated our VirtuAlly solution and are able to safely be on their own.

Flawless Fusion of Patient Care and Technology

From the moment patients enter the emergency department, our unwavering commitment to their safety and well-being sets the stage for their experience.

However, our dedication doesn’t stop there. We continuously monitor progress, enabling timely interventions and activating escalation protocols if necessary. As the patient’s condition improves, our on-site care team, in collaboration with our command center, evaluates their eligibility for readiness to embrace an independent, healthier life.

Together, we’ll redefine what it means to receive exceptional patient care. Contact us to form a partnership or to learn more about our virtual patient monitoring technology.