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Columbia Care is proud to be the first medical marijuana company in New York to offer HIPAA-compliant video consultations to both new and returning registered patients and designated caregivers in New York.

Columbia Care’s video consultations are free of charge in order to assist registered patients and designated caregivers who may find it difficult to visit one of our dispensary locations for a consultation.

Our pharmacists are happy to help patients and caregivers who want to learn about our medical marijuana products, who would like to speak with our staff to adjust product formulation or dosing, or who may want additional instruction on how to use our products.

Who is Eligible?

In order to participate in our video consultation service, patients must meet the following criteria:

  • Be currently enrolled in the New York State medical marijuana program. This includes having:
    • A valid up-to-date Patient Certification issued by a registered medical marijuana practitioner in New York
    • A valid NY Medical Marijuana ID Card or NY Medical Marijuana Caregiver ID Card issued by the New York State Department of Health
  • Have submitted his or her intake paperwork to our dispensary staff ahead of the video consultation
  • Have provided us with a copy of the Patient Certification 24 hours ahead of the video consultation
  • Have provided us a photo or scanned copy of his or her medical marijuana ID card 24 hours ahead of the video consultation

 

Columbia Care video consultations are available for both new and returning patients.

 

Video Consultation Hours

Monday-Friday

9am-4:30pm

 

Scheduling a Video Consultation

If you would like to schedule a Columbia Care video consultation, please visit our online scheduling calendar at the following link: https://virtualny.care/v2/book

For your convenience, a confirmation email will be sent to your email account with the link for your video consultation. If you do not have an email address, you will still be able to schedule a video consultation. Join the consultation by visiting this link: virtualny.care. Our pharmacy staff will reach out to confirm the video consultation dial-in number.

 

Joining a Video Consultation

After scheduling a video consultation, you will receive an e-mail invitation that includes the following:

  • Time and date of the session
  • Two RSVP options: Yes or No (will notify your host)
  • Join Session link

After following the Join Session link, patients will be presented with a Columbia Care virtual waiting room.

Finally, before joining the conference with our Columbia Care PharmD, registered patients and designated caregivers will be prompted by our video consultation platform to navigate final steps.

  • Patients will be prompted to download the Zoom plug-in
  • Patients will prompted to enable access to the computer microphone and camera

 

HIPAA Compliance

Columbia Care is fully committed to protecting all patient data. Our vendor’s platform contains transport encryption with appropriate ciphers, at-rest encryption, software and hardware firewalls, intrusion detection, anti-virus scanning, server segmentation, unique access controls and access auditing, breach reporting, proper media disposal, disaster-recovery plans, and other features. Furthermore, our vendor performs its own yearly internal HIPAA review and participates in a yearly external HIPAA review.

In addition, Columbia Care practices HIPAA-compliant protocol in every respect. If you have any questions, please feel free to reach out to any of our dispensary locations for guidance.