Provider Satisfaction with Rapid Rollout Of A New Telehealth Program At A Pediatric Subspecialty Group Practice During The COVID-19 Pandemic.

Abstract

Background: The national emergency response to the COVID-19 outbreak prompted our practice to rapidlydevelop and deploy a telehealth program The goal was to continue to meet the healthcare needs of ourpatients in a safe and efficient manner Our practice has 117 providers from 23 pediatric subspecialties and atotal staff of 313 Our planning and implementation of the telehealth program started shortly after thedeclaration of a state of emergency by our Governor on March 12th and was piloted within two weeks Toensure a timely rollout, we utilized an external video conferencing platform which was independent of theelectronic medical record Because of this we were able to see 4660 patients (155/day) via telehealth in themonth of April 2020;this compares to 0 telehealth visits and 8799 in-person clinic visits (293 /day) in April2019 The in-person visit to telehealth conversion rate was 52% Objective: We developed a survey to seekfeedback from providers regarding their experience with the telehealth initiative Methods: An electronic survey was sent to 108 providers It included 9 questions to measure provider satisfaction using a 5-pointLikert scale format and a section to comment on challenges faced Questions were designed to assessprovider satisfaction in the following areas: efficiency of converting appointments to telehealth, training,technical support, software user-friendliness, interpreter incorporation, operational workflow, and overall visitquality Results: Fifty two providers responded to the survey with a response rate of 48% 92% of providers were satisfied with the visit quality and 83% with the efficiency of converting appointments to telehealth 90%were satisfied with record accessibility and 89% with ordering tests and labs 75% were satisfied withoperational workflow outside the visit From a technologic perspective the satisfaction was: 80% with technicalsupport, 96% with training received and 100% with software user-friendliness 68% were satisfied with ease ofusing interpreters Several challenges were identified in the comments section including need for improvedpatient education regarding video software, training for support staff, and issues accessing interpreterservices A few felt that telehealth was not a substitute for in-person visits Some expressed exhaustion withcontinuous telehealth visits Concern was expressed by a few regarding some families' inability to accesstelehealth Many expressed interest in continuing telehealth long-term Conclusion: Majority of the providersapproved of the telehealth program The survey feedback provided actionable information to identify issuesand find solutions in a timely manner More exploration is needed to determine long-term sustainability of ourtelehealth program Efforts should emphasize reducing provider burnout Specialty services should think ofways to balance in-person and telehealth services to provide equitable care to patients We hope our findingswill help guide others in launching or improving telehealth programs