Outpatient visits have rebounded to pre-pandemic levels for many providers and patients. In a blog post published by the Commonwealth Fund, associate professor of health care policy Ateev Mehrotra, MD, MPH, Leonard D. Schaeffer Professor of Health Care Policy Michael E. Chernew, PhD, and colleagues report an update on the use of ambulatory care during the COVID-19 pandemic.

As state and local governments have lifted restrictions on travel and non-essential services, outpatient visits have begun to return to normal levels. A substantial increase was seen in mid-May 2020 after the number of ambulatory visits decreased by 60% in April. By late June, that number had plateaued but within the past month has returned to pre-pandemic levels.

Visits for younger children remain substantially lower than they were before the COVID-19 pandemic, while weekly visits to dermatologists, urologists, and adult primary care practitioners now exceed pre-pandemic baselines. Medicare outpatient visits are also exceeding pre-pandemic baselines, while visits to specialists such as pulmonologists and behavioral health care practitioners remain below the baselines.

Use of telehealth, which rose significantly at the beginning of the pandemic, has begun to steadily decline, although visit rates still remain above pre-pandemic levels. The majority of telehealth visits are behavioral health appointments.

This report is part of an ongoing study in collaboration between Harvard University, the Commonwealth Fund, and Phreesia to track the clinical and financial impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on health care in the United States. This report was featured in the Harvard Crimson.