Evaluation of an Electronic Consultation Service for COVID-19 Care.

IF 1.6 4区 材料科学 Q2 METALLURGY & METALLURGICAL ENGINEERING
Jatinderpreet Singh, Gary E Garber, Erin Keely, Sheena Guglani, Clare Liddy
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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Purpose: COVID-19 has increased the need for innovative virtual care solutions. Electronic consultation (eConsult) services allow primary care practitioners to pose clinical questions to specialists using a secure remote application. We examined eConsult cases submitted to a COVID-19 specialist group in order to assess usage patterns, impact on response times and referrals, and the content of clinical questions being asked.

Methods: This was a mixed-methods analysis of eConsult cases submitted between March and September 2020 in Ontario, Canada to 2 services. We performed a descriptive analysis of the average response time and the total time spent by the specialist for eConsults. Primary care practitioners completed a post-eConsult questionnaire that asked about the outcome of the eConsult. We performed an inductive and deductive content analysis of a subset of cases to identify common themes among the clinical questions asked.

Results: A total of 208 primary care practitioners submitted 289 eConsult cases. The median specialist response time was 0.6 days (range = 3 minutes to 15 days); the average time spent by specialists per case was 16 minutes (range = 5 to 59 minutes). In 69 cases (24%), the eConsult enabled avoidance of a face-to-face referral. Content analysis of 51 cases identified 5 major themes: precautions for high-risk and special populations, diagnostic clarification and/or need for COVID-19 testing, guidance on self-isolation and return to work, guidance on personal protective equipment, and management of chronic symptoms.

Conclusions: This study demonstrates the considerable potential of eConsults during a pandemic as our service was quickly implemented across Ontario and resulted in primary care practitioners' rapid and low-barrier access to specialist input.

对 COVID-19 护理电子咨询服务的评估。
目的:COVID-19 增加了对创新虚拟医疗解决方案的需求。电子会诊(eConsult)服务允许初级保健医生使用安全的远程应用程序向专家提出临床问题。我们研究了提交给 COVID-19 专家小组的电子会诊病例,以评估使用模式、对响应时间和转诊的影响以及所提临床问题的内容:这是一项混合方法分析,针对的是 2020 年 3 月至 9 月间在加拿大安大略省向 2 家服务机构提交的 eConsult 案例。我们对电子会诊的平均响应时间和专家花费的总时间进行了描述性分析。初级保健医生填写了一份电子会诊后调查问卷,其中询问了电子会诊的结果。我们对部分病例进行了归纳和演绎内容分析,以确定所提临床问题的共同主题:共有 208 名初级保健医生提交了 289 个电子会诊病例。专家回复时间的中位数为 0.6 天(范围 = 3 分钟至 15 天);专家对每个病例的平均回复时间为 16 分钟(范围 = 5 分钟至 59 分钟)。在 69 个病例(24%)中,电子会诊避免了面对面的转诊。对 51 个病例进行的内容分析确定了 5 大主题:高危人群和特殊人群的预防措施、诊断澄清和/或 COVID-19 检测需求、自我隔离和重返工作岗位指导、个人防护设备指导以及慢性症状管理:这项研究证明了电子咨询在大流行期间的巨大潜力,因为我们的服务在安大略省各地得到了迅速实施,并使初级保健从业人员能够快速、低门槛地获得专家意见。
本文章由计算机程序翻译,如有差异,请以英文原文为准。
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来源期刊
Isij International
Isij International 工程技术-冶金工程
CiteScore
3.40
自引率
16.70%
发文量
268
审稿时长
2.6 months
期刊介绍: The journal provides an international medium for the publication of fundamental and technological aspects of the properties, structure, characterization and modeling, processing, fabrication, and environmental issues of iron and steel, along with related engineering materials.
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