Plan the conversation
Visit checklist: what an online assessment involves
An online visit still needs a way to understand your concern. Ask how the person providing your care will gather the information they need.
Where can you come back with a question?
Will you talk live or send information?
Telehealth can involve a live conversation or an exchange that the person providing your care reviews later.
An asynchronous visit means you and the person providing your care do not need to be online together.
As of September 26, 2026, advice for state medical boards allowed either kind of visit only when it met the required level of medical care. State rules differed.
This includes getting enough information to assess the patient and decide on treatment.
Can the conversation go further than a form?
Treatment based solely on a fixed questionnaire was unacceptable under advice issued by the Federation of State Medical Boards, as of September 26, 2026.
Its advice supports forms when the person providing care can ask more questions about the patient’s health.
These are recommendations for state medical boards, not a nationwide law.
Ask how you can reply to the person providing your care and ask your own questions.
What if a screen is not enough?
Advice for state medical boards says needed tests must be done or arranged, or the patient directed to a place that can do them.
It also says to direct the patient to care in person when a needed examination cannot be done online.
Ask who would arrange that next step and what it would cost.
What can you bring to the visit?
Write down your concern, the medicines and supplements you take, and the questions you want answered. Bring any records you want the person providing your care to consider.
Ask how you will hear the plan after the visit. Ask who answers questions between visits and how follow-up is charged.