Awareness and Expectations of Telerehabilitation among Physiotherapists of Ahmedabad

Abstract

Background: Telerehabilitation is the delivery of rehabilitation services via information and communication technologies to the patients. Some of these services include therapeutic interventions, remote monitoring of progress, consultation, training and a means of networking for People with Disabilities. The impact ranges from patients easy access to specialist facilitation of care and low cost to clinician entered benefits. Information technology knowledge and utilization seems to be less explored in health sector. This study was aimed to assess the awareness and expectations of telerehabilitation among physiotherapists Purpose: In next generation of any profession or discipline uptake of telerehabilitation can be enhanced when they have positive attitude towards its utilization. Therefore, there is a need to evaluate the awareness and expectations of telerehabilitation among the physiotherapists Methodology: A survey was done utilizing originally developed questionnaire focused on telemedicine services, mostly rehabilitation with the prior permission of the author. The respondents where the UG & PG students, clinicians, academicians. Results: 95.42% physiotherapists think telerehabilitation refers to use of information and communication technologies to provide rehabilitation services to people remotely in their home or other environment. 89.54% think telerehabilitation services include therapeutic intervention, remote monitoring of progress, consultation, training and a means of networking for people with disabilities. 83.78% think telerehabilitation enables clinicians to remotely engage & deliver patient care outside of medical setting, thus eliminating the issue of distance between clinician and patient. Conclusion: The academicians, clinical therapist and the students are having good awareness about telerehabilitation. Knowledge of Telerehabilitation is more profound in clinicians as well as academicians but comparatively less in the students. Keywords: Tele-rehabilitation, knowledge, awareness, healthcare, remote rehabilitation assistance.