Teleconsultations in Public Primary Care Units of the City of Belo Horizonte, Brazil: Profile of Patients and Physicians

Abstract

The aim of this study is to report patient and physician profiles of those who used the teleconsultation system in the primary care health units of a health district in the city of Belo Horizonte, MG, Brazil. Data were collected from the telehealth attendance records of nine Primary Health Units (Unidade Básica de Saúde [UBS] in Portuguese) and from interviews carried out with the referring physicians. The criteria for inclusion required that data come from users seen by means of telehealth in the period between December 2004 and August 2010 and from the practitioners who saw them. The following were excluded: physicians who were not working in the UBS when the data were collected and a physician who did not agree to take part in the study. Two hundred sixty-three teleconsultations were analyzed, and 20 referring physicians were interviewed. The offline method was the most common. The physicians were predominantly female and had graduated over 11 years ago. The patients were predominantly adult women. After teleconsultation, a prescription was not necessary for 9.8% of patients. When required, 83.2% of the medication was available in the UBS. In 68.3% of cases, additional tests were required. The incorporation of these technologies prevented the physical referral of patients in 64.2% of cases. Telehealth resources can help to improve the provision of primary healthcare, reducing the number of physically referred patients. The number of teleconsultations is still small, and there is a need to encourage physicians to use the system.