McKenna Mary Clare, Al-Hinai Mahmood, Bradley David, Doran Elisabeth, Hunt Isabelle, Hutchinson Siobhan, Langan Yvonne, O'Rourke Deirdre, Qasem Raga, Redmond Janice, Troy Emma, Doherty Colin P
Neurology Department, St. James's Hospital, Dublin, Ireland,
Neurology Department, St. James's Hospital, Dublin, Ireland.
Eur Neurol. 2020;83(6):622-625. doi: 10.1159/000511900. Epub 2020 Nov 4.
Telemedicine has been widely implemented during the COVID-19 global pandemic to enable continuity of care of chronic illnesses. We modified our general neurology clinic to be conducted using remote audio-only telephone consultations. We included all patients over a 10-week period who agreed to both a telephone consultation and a questionnaire afterwards in order to ascertain the patient's perspective of the experience. There were 212 participants consisting of men (43.8%) and women (56.2%). The mean ± standard deviation of age was 47.8 ± 17.0 (range 17-93) years. For the most part, patients found remote consultations either "just as good" (67.1%) or "better" (9.0%) than face-to-face consultations. Those who deemed it to be "not as good" were significantly older (52.3 ± 17.9 years vs. 46.6 ± 16.6 years, p =0.045) or were more likely to have a neurological disorder that required clinical examination, namely, a neuromuscular condition (66.7%, p = 0.002) or an undiagnosed condition (46.7%, p = 0.031). At the height of the COVID-19 global pandemic, most patients were satisfied with remote consultations. The positive feedback for remote consultations needs to be verified outside of this unique scenario because the results were likely influenced by the patients' apprehension to attend the hospital amongst other factors.
在新冠疫情全球大流行期间,远程医疗已被广泛应用,以确保慢性病护理的连续性。我们将普通神经科门诊改为仅通过远程音频电话咨询进行。我们纳入了在10周内同意进行电话咨询并在之后填写问卷的所有患者,以便了解患者对这种体验的看法。共有212名参与者,其中男性占43.8%,女性占56.2%。年龄的平均值±标准差为47.8±17.0(范围17 - 93)岁。在很大程度上,患者认为远程咨询与面对面咨询“一样好”(67.1%)或“更好”(9.0%)。那些认为“不如面对面咨询好”的患者年龄显著更大(52.3±17.9岁对46.6±16.6岁,p = 0.045),或者更有可能患有需要临床检查的神经系统疾病,即神经肌肉疾病(66.7%,p = 0.002)或未确诊疾病(46.7%,p = 0.031)。在新冠疫情全球大流行高峰期,大多数患者对远程咨询感到满意。远程咨询的积极反馈需要在这种特殊情况之外进行验证,因为结果可能受到患者对前往医院的担忧等其他因素的影响。