Wofford James L, Campos Claudia L, Johnson Dominic A, Brown Monica T
Department of Internal Medicine, Wake Forest University School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, NC 27157, USA.
Inform Prim Care. 2012;20(2):141-6. doi: 10.14236/jhi.v20i2.34.
The advent of more mobile, more reliable, and more affordable videoconferencing technology finally makes it realistic to offer remote foreign language interpretation in the office setting. Still, such technologies deserve proof of acceptability to clinicians and patients before there is widespread acceptance and routine use.
We sought to examine: (1) the audio and video technical fidelity of iPad/Facetime(TM) software, (2) the acceptability of videoconferencing to patients and clinicians.
The convenience sample included Spanish-speaking adult patients at a community health care medicine clinic in 2011. Videoconferencing was conducted using two iPads(TM) connecting patient/physician located in the clinic examination room, and the interpreter in a remote/separate office in the same building. A five-item survey was used to solicit opinions on overall quality of the videoconferencing device, audio/video integrity/fidelity, perception of encounter duration, and attitude toward future use.
Twenty-five patients, 18 clinicians and 5 interpreters participated in the project. Most patients (24/25) rated overall quality of videoconferencing as good/excellent with only 1 'fair' rating. Eleven patients rated the amount of time as no longer than in-person, and nine reported it as shorter than inperson. Most patients, 94.0% (24/25), favoured using videoconferencing during future visits. For the 18 clinicians, the results were similar.
Based on our experience at a singlesite community health centre, the videoconferencing technology appeared to be flawless, and both patients and clinicians were satisfied. Expansion of videoconferencing to other off-site healthcare professionals should be considered in the search for more cost-effective healthcare.
更便于携带、更可靠且更经济实惠的视频会议技术的出现，终于使得在办公室环境中提供远程外语口译成为现实。不过，在这些技术得到广泛接受和常规使用之前，它们的可接受性仍需向临床医生和患者证明。
我们试图检验：（1）iPad/Facetime(TM)软件的音频和视频技术保真度，（2）视频会议对患者和临床医生的可接受性。
便利样本包括2011年在一家社区医疗诊所讲西班牙语的成年患者。使用两台iPad(TM)进行视频会议，连接位于诊所检查室的患者/医生以及同一栋楼中远程/独立办公室的口译员。通过一项包含五个项目的调查来征求对视频会议设备整体质量、音频/视频完整性/保真度、对会诊时长的感知以及对未来使用的态度的意见。
25名患者、18名临床医生和5名口译员参与了该项目。大多数患者（24/25）将视频会议的整体质量评为良好/优秀，只有1人评为“一般”。11名患者认为时间长度不超过面对面会诊，9名患者表示比面对面会诊短。大多数患者，94.0%（24/25），赞成在未来就诊时使用视频会议。对于18名临床医生，结果类似。
基于我们在单站点社区健康中心的经验，视频会议技术似乎完美无缺，患者和临床医生都很满意。在寻求更具成本效益的医疗保健时，应考虑将视频会议扩展到其他非现场医疗专业人员。
