Establishing a telemedicine program for interventional radiology: a study of patient opinion and experience

PURPOSE The COVID-19 pandemic forced healthcare officials to implement new policies, such as the use of virtual consultations over office-based medical appointments, to reduce the transmission of the virus. The purpose of this study is to quantitatively compare patients' experiences with virtual outpatient telemedicine encounters at a single academic institution in Interventional Radiology (IR) and in-person visits during the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. METHODS The TeleENT Satisfaction Questionnaire and the Medical Communication Competence Scale (MCCS) were used to survey patients' satisfaction with both in-person and virtual office visits. RESULTS Ninety respondents (38 in-person, 52 virtual) acknowledged numerous benefits of virtual visits versus in-person office visits including reductions in time, cost, and potential viral transmission risk during the COVID-19 pandemic. No statistically significant difference was noted, based on a Likert scale from 1 to 7, between in-person and virtual visits (all p > 0.05) for scheduling related factors. No statistically significant difference was noted in any of the MCCS subscales between the two cohorts in regards to medical information communication (all p > 0.05). A majority of patients with virtual encounters (82.7%) stated that it was easy to obtain an electronic device for use during the telemedicine visit, and 73.1% of patients felt that setting up the telemedicine encounter was easy. CONCLUSION This study demonstrates that telemedicine is an acceptable alternative to in-office appointments and could increase access to IR care outside of the traditional physician-patient interaction. With telemedicine visits, patients can communicate their concerns and obtain information from the doctor with noninferior communication compared to in-person visits.