{"title":"Remote care - good for some, but not for all?","authors":"Catherine Pope","doi":"10.1177/13558196231172715","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"The COVID-19 pandemic fuelled an unprecedented expansion in remote health service delivery globally and employers and governments encouraged people to stay at home to reduce the spread of the virus. In many countries, including the United Kingdom (UK), primary and secondary health care shifted rapidly to ‘remote by default’, with a substantial increase in the use of virtual care such as home monitoring and home based treatment, supported by telephone and online methods to interact with patients and care service users. Remote care has long been advocated, not least by companies that market digital technologies. The promise is convenience and choice: features that many people enjoy in other areas of everyday life, with many government, financial and consumer services moving to digital first, or digital only modalities. As we move from the pandemic, remote care delivery in the UK is becoming a ‘new normal’: the number of telephone appointments in general practice rose from 3.5 million in 2019 to 11.4 million in March 2021. Remote home monitoring or virtual (COVID) wards proliferated during the pandemic, despite a rapid systematic review in 2021 being unable to reach substantive conclusions regarding efficiency, safety or the identification of early deterioration for patients with COVID-19. In the USA, remote patient monitoring increased more than fourfold during the pandemic and the UK has set the ambitious aim to have introduced 40–50 ‘virtual ward beds’ per 100,000 population by December 2023. There is also growing research interest in other forms of remote care such as telephone and online triage and video consulting.","PeriodicalId":15953,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Health Services Research & Policy","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":1.9000,"publicationDate":"2023-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Journal of Health Services Research & Policy","FirstCategoryId":"3","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1177/13558196231172715","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q3","JCRName":"HEALTH POLICY & SERVICES","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic fuelled an unprecedented expansion in remote health service delivery globally and employers and governments encouraged people to stay at home to reduce the spread of the virus. In many countries, including the United Kingdom (UK), primary and secondary health care shifted rapidly to ‘remote by default’, with a substantial increase in the use of virtual care such as home monitoring and home based treatment, supported by telephone and online methods to interact with patients and care service users. Remote care has long been advocated, not least by companies that market digital technologies. The promise is convenience and choice: features that many people enjoy in other areas of everyday life, with many government, financial and consumer services moving to digital first, or digital only modalities. As we move from the pandemic, remote care delivery in the UK is becoming a ‘new normal’: the number of telephone appointments in general practice rose from 3.5 million in 2019 to 11.4 million in March 2021. Remote home monitoring or virtual (COVID) wards proliferated during the pandemic, despite a rapid systematic review in 2021 being unable to reach substantive conclusions regarding efficiency, safety or the identification of early deterioration for patients with COVID-19. In the USA, remote patient monitoring increased more than fourfold during the pandemic and the UK has set the ambitious aim to have introduced 40–50 ‘virtual ward beds’ per 100,000 population by December 2023. There is also growing research interest in other forms of remote care such as telephone and online triage and video consulting.
期刊介绍:
Journal of Health Services Research & Policy provides a unique opportunity to explore the ideas, policies and decisions shaping health services throughout the world. Edited and peer-reviewed by experts in the field and with a high academic standard and multidisciplinary approach, readers will gain a greater understanding of the current issues in healthcare policy and research. The journal"s strong international editorial advisory board also ensures that readers obtain a truly global and insightful perspective.