We hope everyone is doing well now that summer has officially kicked off! We’re sure people are busy with lots of travel planning, so we’d love to take this opportunity to fill you in on some important details around virtual care at Firefly while traveling.

Some new rules around location-based care

Some states have strict laws that require clinicians to be licensed in the state where a patient is physically located at the time of a video visit. During the COVID-19 Public Health Emergency, states temporarily relaxed these licensing requirements. States permitted out-of-state licensed clinicians to provide video visits to new and established patients, regardless of where the patient was residing at the time of the appointment. This was done to ensure patients received necessary care during the pandemic.

In recent months, however, states have started rolling back the emergency measures that relaxed these rules. They are reverting to standard (pre-pandemic) requirements. These rules state that a clinician needs to be licensed in the state that the patient is in at the time of the appointment in order to conduct a video visit. 

To ensure our clinicians stay in compliance with state laws, as of June 30, 2021, Firefly Health will provide video visits only to patients who are physically present in our current service area (which we have outlined below). We can no longer conduct video visits for patients who are outside of our service area. Video visits that have already been scheduled through June 30, 2021 for those outside our service area can be conducted. If you will be within Firefly’s service area, at the time of your video appointment, then this notice does not apply to you.

Firefly Health’s service area

These are the states in which Firefly Health can currently conduct video visits:

• Massachusetts
• Maine
• New Hampshire
• New Jersey
• New York
• Rhode Island
• Connecticut

What if I live permanently outside Firefly’s service area? 

If you live permanently outside of Firefly’s service area, please message us in the app. We are expanding the states we serve quickly and want to work with you. If you are out of these states, please still contact us and we can assess your needs and help you, but we will not be able to conduct a video visit.  

What does this mean if I am traveling outside of Firefly’s service area? 

As we have always done, if you are traveling outside of our area and need medical advice, you can chat in the Firefly Health app with your care team or call the on-call clinician. Although we can no longer provide you a scheduled video visit after June 30th, when traveling outside our service area, we can assess your situation and direct you to appropriate care in the area that you are visiting.

We thank you for trusting us to safely care for you during the pandemic and beyond. If you have any questions about this or anything else, don’t hesitate to reach out to your Firefly Health care team. You can chat with us or schedule a visit in the app today.