Before the visit
The service tells you who provides care, how the visit works and what the full price includes.
Welcome desk / care map
What happens at an online care visit
A real visit is more than a product menu. It is a chance to explain your goals, answer health questions, understand the choice, and know what happens next.
Only a clinician can decide whether a medicine suits you. The clinician is the doctor, or a nurse or physician assistant, who is allowed to prescribe.
The care map
A useful visit has a beginning, a decision and follow-up
The assessment
The assessment is the health check. The clinician asks enough to understand the reason for care, health history, current medicines and any tests or examination that may matter.
The decision
The clinician explains the exact product, its intended use, likely effects, important risks and other choices. “No prescription” is also a possible medical decision.
The handoff
If you get a prescription, the service tells you which pharmacy will send it. It also names the exact product and its form: a pen, a small bottle for shots, or a pill.
Follow-up
You know how to reach a clinician with questions, what will be checked, and what could change the plan.
The standard does not shrink
The screen changes the setting, not the duty of care
Care given by video, phone or message has to meet the same professional bar that an in-person appointment does.
As of September 2026, a physician generally needed a licence, or some other legal right to practise, from the state the patient was in during the visit.
When a screen is not enough
If the proper assessment calls for an examination, lab work or another test, the clinician has to arrange it, complete it or refer the patient.
Visit prep sheet
Put your facts and questions in one place
These prompts are for your own notes. They are saved only in this browser when you press the save button.
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Sources for this map
The care standard behind this map
The Federation of State Medical Boards brings together, at the national level, the state boards that license doctors. It writes suggested rules. Each state decides its own rules, and those are the ones that count.
Online care and the same standard of care
This policy explains who needs a licence, how the clinician should check your health, when tests are needed and what follow-up looks like in online care.
Read the FSMB policyHow physician licence records work
The Federation of State Medical Boards explains what state boards make public about licences and discipline.
Read the FSMB consumer guide