E-consulting in a medical specialist setting: Medicine of the future?

Today's technology provides new ways of consulting between patients and medical specialists in health care, such as videoconferencing and web-messaging. In this systematic review we assessed the effects of e-consulting between medical specialists and patients.

We searched MEDLINE, EMBASE, Psychlit and Cochrane Library for randomized clinical trials assessing the use of e-consulting methods (videoconferencing (VC) or web-messaging (WM)), as compared to conventional care (face-to-face (FF) or telephone consultations (TC)) in a medical specialist setting. We extracted patient-related, physician-related, cost, time and follow-up outcomes.

We included 21 trials, of which 17 addressed VC compared to FF, two compared WM with FF, one VC with TC, and one WM with TC. Physicians appeared to prefer face-to-face consultations over videoconferencing. Patients appeared to be as satisfied with videoconferencing as with face-to-face contacts, but preferred videoconferencing and web-messaging over telephone consultations. Videoconferencing was more expensive regarding equipment, but saved patient-related costs in terms of time, transportation, and missed work. Variable results were found for consult time and follow-up visits.

We cautiously conclude that e-consulting seems a feasible alternative to medical specialists' face-to-face follow-up or telephone appointments, but may be less suitable for initial consultations requiring physical examination.