{"title":"Assessment of virtual healthcare: predictors of access and utilization before, during,\u0000and after the COVID-19 pandemic","authors":"W. Hills, Matthew Murphy, Karen T. Hills","doi":"10.5604/01.3001.0015.5391","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5604/01.3001.0015.5391","url":null,"abstract":"Background: Societal needs highlighted by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic have resulted in rapid telehealth development and implementation. The broadening of guidelines for practice by regulatory bodies have\u0000allowed providers to employ video-capable devices in the virtual delivery of services to physical- and mentalhealth clients located across a broad range of settings.\u0000Aim of the study: This study examined use of synchronous, video-based, virtual healthcare before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. This included a comparison of: access for physical and mental health needs;\u0000differential assessment of service provision by professionals; consumer satisfaction; and, anticipated future\u0000use of virtual healthcare.\u0000Material and Methods: An online survey link was sent to three participant groups: college-aged students,\u0000adults, and retirement-aged persons. A total of 685 participants, varying in age, gender, ethnicity, and experience using tele-healthcare provided usable data for this study.\u0000Results: Half of participants (49.2%; n=337) used virtual healthcare; more people used it during the pandemic (87.2%; n=294) than before (26.4%; n=89). Physical services (86.8%; n=291; primarily physicians) were\u0000more common than mental health services (25.6%; n=86; primarily counselors). Access was most common\u0000through laptop computers (60.7%; n=204). Participants were satisfied with virtual healthcare experiences\u0000(Mdn=5). Almost all participants (94.2%; n=645) believed that virtual healthcare would continue after the\u0000pandemic, but only two-thirds (61.3%; n=420) reported they would use virtual healthcare if available in the\u0000future. Both previous experience with (p<0.001) and satisfaction with (p<0.001) virtual healthcare positively\u0000predicted anticipated future use.\u0000Conclusions: Tele-healthcare has experienced significant growth in the COVID-19 era. Emergency policy\u0000changes have resulted in services being developed and offered in the medical and mental health realms in\u0000conjunction with ongoing empirical evaluations of what does and does not work.\u0000\u0000","PeriodicalId":32604,"journal":{"name":"Medical Science Pulse","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2021-10-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47086196","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}