COVID-19 Pandemic and Telehealth: allergy patient perspectives in an urban, academic medical center

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic created an unprecedented need for telehealth. Studies exploring patient’s perspective and access to telehealth technology are lacking. This study aims to assess the patient perspective on telehealth technology during the COVID pandemic. A survey was created by a multi-disciplinary team at an urban academic center which includes questions addressing patients’ access and satisfaction with telehealth visits (phone and/or video). Survey was distributed to 346 patients in a mixed allergy/pulmonary outpatient clinic via email, text message, phone, or in-person. Data was analyzed using Fisher’s exact test. Survey response rate was 22.5% (n=78). Respondents were middle-aged (mean=51.6 years), minority (68%) women (82%). All patients reported having phone access to complete telehealth visits; however, only 83% report access to a smartphone and 82% had access to a computer/tablet. Over half of patients previously used a video conferencing application (62%). Telehealth visits during the pandemic were deemed “acceptable” by over two-thirds of respondents, with 15% finding telehealth “unacceptable”. Almost two-thirds of respondents had no concerns/barriers related to telehealth visits (63%), while only 27% had no concerns/barriers for in-person visits (p<0.01). This finding remained significant when COVID-19 was eliminated as concern (p= 0.02). In our study of urban, minority allergy patients, a majority of patients had access to at least one device to complete a telehealth visit. Patients encountered minimal barriers to telehealth technology and found these visits acceptable to complete their clinical encounter. Additional work is needed to determine how to incorporate allergy telehealth within and beyond the COVID-19 pandemic.