The Impact of COVID-19 on Telemedicine

Abstract

With the improvement of telecommunication and computer technology, telemedicine has been deployed to meet the clinical needs of patients and providers, primarily in the areas of mental health, chronic disease management, and patient education. Most comprehensive healthcare systems developed infrastructures that have allowed them to provide telemedicine services to their patients for over a decade. Veteran Affairs (VA) Healthcare Systems has been at the forefront of delivering healthcare through telemedicine, but the adoption by patients and providers had been slow until the advent of COVID-19. The aim of this study is to understand the ethnographies of the impact of COVID-19 on telemedicine through the data in a large VA medical center. It also explores the impact of COVID-19 on telemedicine in clinical and social economical dimensions in different specialties and clinical settings.