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Navigating ADHD in Primary Care with Dr. Celia Robichaud

Virtual Hallway recently hosted a highly anticipated session led by Dr. Celia Robichaud, a child and adolescent psychiatrist, focused on the challenges of managing Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in primary care settings. Dr. Robichaud shared expert strategies for identifying, diagnosing, and managing ADHD, from youth to adulthood, while addressing the complexities of comorbid conditions […]

Transforming Care: Focus on CKD and Type 2 Diabetes

Virtual Hallway recently hosted a dynamic webinar to kick off the academic year, focusing on simplifying Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) management in patients with type 2 diabetes. Led by nephrologist Dr. David Cherney and moderated by Dr. Jacob Cookey, the session reviewed new strategies for improving patient outcomes. The webinar spotlighted the FLOW study, which […]

Introducing "Resources": Your Curated Library of Medical Information

At Virtual Hallway, we are always striving to enhance the experience for our specialists and provide tools that make your work more efficient and impactful. That’s why we’re excited to introduce our newest feature: Resources. What is Resources? Resources is a dedicated space within our platform where you can view valuable materials such as papers, […]

Empowering Women's Health: A Closer Look at Non-Communicable Diseases

As we observe Women's Health Month, let’s broaden our focus beyond reproductive health to address the leading causes of morbidity and mortality among women—non-communicable diseases (NCDs). At Virtual Hallway, our commitment is to empower healthcare professionals with the knowledge and tools to tackle these health challenges through expert-led discussions and collaborations. Understanding the Impact of […]

Say Goodbye to Missed Details

Virtual Hallway's 'Notes' Simplifies Your Clinical Documentation In a clinician’s day packed with patient consultations, impromptu discussions with colleagues, and countless phone calls, the challenge isn’t just about capturing patient encounter details—it's about efficiently documenting the myriad of interactions that inform patient care. That's where the "Notes" feature in the Virtual Hallway mobile app comes […]

Exploring the Depths of IBS: A Clinical Perspective

With Dr. Rodrigues Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) presents a complex challenge in gastroenterology, characterized by a spectrum of symptoms that defy a one-size-fits-all approach. The recent lecture, "Ins and Outs of IBS," offers clinicians a deep dive into the nuanced understanding of this prevalent condition, blending the latest research with clinical insights to advance patient […]

5 Ways to Get the Most Out of Our Continuing Medical Education Events

In the rapidly evolving field of healthcare, Continuing Medical Education (CME) remains a cornerstone for professionals aiming to enhance their knowledge and skills. Virtual Hallway offers a suite of CME events designed to meet your learning needs. Here’s how you can maximize the value of these offerings: 1. Watch It Live The best way to […]

Bridging the Rural-Urban Divide: A Glimpse at a Revolution in Rural Healthcare

Healthcare access, specifically to specialist care, has remained a persistent challenge for rural communities worldwide. Countries like Canada and the United States experience significant disparities in the number of physicians and specialists per 100,000 residents compared to their urban counterparts. The resulting impact? Rural patients tend to experience higher rates of chronic diseases, preventable hospitalizations, […]

Top 10 Indications for Peer-to-Peer Phone Consults through Virtual Hallway

Here are the top 10 indications for using these consults to enhance your practice and improve patient care:

Dr. Shirley Lee Sheds Light on Medicolegal Considerations for Virtual Care and Hallway Consults

Expert Physician Advisor Delivers Insightful Lecture on Navigating the World of Virtual Care The landscape of healthcare is rapidly evolving, and virtual care is becoming an integral part of modern medical practice. Dr. Shirley Lee, a renowned physician advisor at the Canadian Medical Protective Association, recently delivered a captivating lecture on the medicolegal considerations for […]

Virtual Hallway partners with Nova Scotia Mental Health and Addictions Program and Nova Scotia Health Innovation Hub to enhance mental health care access.

We at Virtual Hallway are excited to announce our collaboration with the Nova Scotia Mental Health and Addictions Program (MHAP) and the Nova Scotia Health Innovation Hub. Our collaboration aims to improve access to mental health care in Nova Scotia, where the system is overburdened and many people struggle to receive the care they need. […]

Speeding Up Care: How Synchronous Phone Consults Can Mitigate ER Overcrowding

Our healthcare system is faced with a number of challenges, from overcrowded emergency departments to long wait times for specialist care. In order to improve access to care and reduce overuse of emergency departments, many healthcare providers are turning to a solutions that can make specialist consultation more effective. These innovative technologies offers a range […]

How do phone consultations compare to electronic consultations in Ontario?

For Family Doctors and Nurse Practitioners in Ontario who need access to specialists, asynchronous eConsults and synchronous phone-based Virtual Hallway are both secure and free-to-use solutions. Most importantly, each tool helps primary care providers keep patients off the wait list and deliver better, faster and often life-saving outcomes to patients. When considering which tool to best […]

What's new? Specialist to Specialist consults

Answering consult questions is a fundamental aspect of specialty medicine. However, specialists see patients of their own and often want to run patient cases by other physicians. Similar to other healthcare providers, specialists face the same barriers to connecting with colleagues - endless phone tag, misaligned schedules, and challenging documentation requirements. Solution: Virtual Hallway Specialist […]

Common Q's: Psychiatry consults

Primary care providers (PCPs) play an increasingly large role in the diagnosis and management of mental and behavioral health conditions. Often times, a quick and collaborative discussion between the PCP and a local psychiatrist is enough to optimize a patient's care plan within the primary care setting. We often get queries about which types of […]

Waiting, wondering, worsening: A patient’s waitlist journey

Meet Liz, 24. She has a hard time focusing at work. Liz visited her family doctor for this reason. While assessing Liz, they found she had a fast heartbeat and an abnormal ECG, causing hesitancy about prescribing ADHD medication to improve her attention. With Liz's best interest in mind, she was referred to an internist for an […]

The art of the hallway consult

“Can I get your thoughts on this?” “Can I run something by you?” These are familiar questions asked by primary care providers to specialists. Questions like these are part of the daily discourse of medicine, coined hallway consults. Let’s take a look back Traditionally, hallway consults occurred in elevators, lunch rooms or hospital corridors (earning […]

Some brief thoughts on benzos and Z-drugs

Benzodiazepines (benzos) and Z-drugs (zopiclone, eszopiclone, zolpidem) are familiar to prescribers in general practice and certain specialty practices (e.g. mental health, addictions, pain clinics, etc). These medications are often sought after due to their significant, and almost immediate, efficacy for treating common conditions. But they can also be sought because of their habit forming properties […]

How a rural family doctor overcame her remote location to bring specialist care to her patients

A Family Physician returned to the Maritimes to set up a practice in the remote community in which she grew up. While she worked in Toronto, she longed for the Nova Scotia’s beautiful vistas and the strong sense of community. When the community’s family doctor retired, she knew this was her chance to go home. […]

Patients: how to get help when there’s a waitlist to see a specialist

Wait times to see specialists are long. The median wait time in Canada to see a specialist is nearly five months, and depending on the province you are living in, it can be as long as 53 weeks. While governments and physicians are continually looking for solutions to these problems, if you are one of […]

5 Password tips for healthcare professionals

Good passwords are key to protecting sensitive information. You may be using passwords that seem to be strong and that fit those common password rules that websites force you into. But, how truly secure are your passwords? You might be surprised to learn that most passwords under 9 characters in length can be easily broken […]

Common Q's: Internal Medicine Consults

Practitioners on Virtual Hallway spend a lot of time thinking how best to help their patients. We often get queries about what types of problems make a good consult request. Having effective consult requests can streamline the entire consultation process, allowing more quality time spent problem solving through the patient’s problem. So what are some […]

Virtual health care solutions; utilizing both synchronous and asynchronous communication in a clinic setting.

With the explosion of virtual health care solutions, it is easy to get lost in what exactly it is different technologies offer. Each new solution has unique advantages, and each solution will impact different team members in different ways. Understanding what a new virtual health solution offers is key to its successful adoption. Development of a telehealth strategy within clinics […]

How Does Virtual Hallway Protect Data?

Privacy and security are critical and Virtual Hallway was constructed with this in mind, every step of the way. We’ve implemented our processes to ensure that everything is kept safe and secure. Our privacy infrastructure was created in collaboration with top level security consultants. Here is a brief overview of key security features: Organizational Culture […]

Nova Scotia’s rural communities struggling to attract mental health providers

Incentivizing Mental Health Providers to Offer Travelling Services I hung up my phone after a long call with a clinic manager in a rural Nova Scotia community. She called to ask if I knew of any psychiatrists who would be available to work in her community one day a week. She pleaded, “We are desperate […]

Inter-Professional Phone Consults: Enhancing connectivity between primary and specialty care as the solution to specialist wait times.

Growing Waitlists in Canada Long wait times for specialist consultation have been well documented in Canada. The median time from referral by a primary care practitioner to specialist intervention in Canada is 22.6 weeks. The length of the wait time for specialist consultation has increased by 184% between 1993 and 2020.[1] There is variation between […]