As Digital Journal has reported, telemedicine can beat face-to-face care in several situations. This includes aiding mental health provision, where the geographical issues that can get in the way of providing specialist care can be overcome. With mental health issues, these extend to treating panic and generalized anxiety disorders.
Telemedicine is concerned with the application of different approaches, using communications technology, for the remote diagnosis and treatment of patients by qualified medical and healthcare practitioners.
The new research is titled “Should You Offer Telemedicine Services? Patients Weigh In”, and it comes from the company Software Advice. To undertake the research, Software Advice reached out to close to 400 patients across the U.S. to study and evaluate their understanding of the telemedicine market.
The survey finds that 66 percent of patients polled said they have never used telemedicine services. However, lack of provision is not a sign of a lack of interest since 81 percent of patients said they are more likely to select a medical provider that offers telemedicine services over one that does not when choosing doctors.
In terms of the types of medical treatment, patients indicated they are more interested in seeking telemedicine services for minor symptoms like allergies, colds, or nausea, but still prefer in-person consultations for more serious issues like injuries. To match this, 96 percent of U.S. hospitals plan to expand their telemedical and virtual care services in 2020.
With regards to what the appeal factor of telemedicine is, one out of three patients said that having no physical exam is the biggest challenge of telemedicine. Commenting on this, Josh Muraki, medical advisor team manager at Software Advice said: “Being able to serve patients at their convenience elevates the patient experience and increases visits, and that’s becoming the competitive norm. Software providers know that this has to be part of their offer, and medical practices know that this is something they need to have.”
