FCC Funds Telehealth Deployment through Rural
Health Care Pilot Program
By Randall
B. Lowe and Travis Litman
[May 2007]
On May 7, 2007, the Federal Communications
Commission (“Commission”) closed its filing window
for applications to its Rural Health Care (RHC) Pilot Program
(“Pilot Program”). Established by Order in September
2006, the Pilot Program marks the first step for the Commission
as it considers revising its Universal Service Rural Health
Care Rules (47 C.F.R. 501 et seq.). By the institution of the
Pilot Program, the Commission has embarked toward a new paradigm
of funds-disbursement to enhance public and non-profit health
care providers’ access to advanced telecommunications
and information services.
For rural health care providers, RHC funding traditionally
affords the means by which basic telephony and Internet services
can be obtained at similar costs that urban healthcare providers
expect to incur. The Pilot Program goes one step further in
funding not only offsets, but also the design and build out
of new broadband networks to achieve further opportunities in
telehealth and telemedicine implementation.
For the first time, the Commission has opened the RHC support
mechanism to fund the deployment of broadband networks and connections
to National LambdaRail for health care providers. Under the
Program, applicants were invited to submit proposals by which
they were free to choose any technology or provider of broadband
connectivity in order to enhance their telemedicine and telehealth
activities. In turn, the Commission will consider the proposals
and may fund up to 85 percent of the total costs of broadband
deployment for successful applicants.
The funds for the Pilot Program will come from the Commission’s
RHC support mechanism, which was created in response to the
Telecommunications Act of 1996’s charge to provide rural
healthcare providers with “an affordable rate for the
services necessary for the provision of telemedicine and instruction,
relating to such services.” However, since then, the Commission’s
resulting RHC support mechanism has been chronically underutilized.
To help this underutilization, the Commission now estimates
that approximately $55-60 million will be available under the
Pilot Program.
The Commission’s confessed purpose of the Pilot Program
is to provide information and “lay the foundation for
a future rulemaking proceeding that will explore permanent rules
to enhance access to advanced services for public and non-profit
healthcare providers.” In fact, there is currently an
open proceeding seeking comment on further modification to the
RHC support mechanism. The Commission’s Pilot Program
opens the door to not only how the Pilot Program will be implemented,
but also what will be the Commission’s next steps to address
universal service support for rural health care providers generally.
Davis Wright Tremaine LLP
offers integrated expertise in health, communications and information
technology law. If you would like additional information about
the RHC Pilot Program or other related matters, please contact
us.
This advisory is a publication
of the Health Information Technology and Communications Groups
of Davis Wright Tremaine LLP. Our purpose in publishing this
advisory is to inform our clients and friends of recent legal
developments. It is not intended, nor should it be used, as
a substitute for specific legal advice as legal counsel may
only be given in response to inquiries regarding particular
situations.
Copyright 2007, Davis Wright Tremaine
LLP.
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