Rightly or wrongly, Mississippi is not generally regarded as a leader in health. The state, which opted out of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) Medicaid expansion, consistently ranks in the bottom two states for most health indicators: infant mortality and low birth weight, obesity, cancer deaths, and diabetes outcomes.  Mississippi, however, is making significant efforts to be  a leader in telehealth. In 2014, the state initiated The Diabetes Telehealth Network, the first program of its kind to provide remote diabetes management and specialty care to rural, medically underserved populations in the Mississippi Delta through internet-capable computer tablets. Mississippi’s telehealth model is gaining national attention for its promise of significant cost-savings by preventing complications and hospital admissions while reducing the demand for expensive specialty services.
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