Related Experiment Video
Updated: Aug 7, 2025
Digital Home-Monitoring of Patients after Kidney Transplantation: The MACCS Platform
Published on: April 12, 2021
Potential use of telemedicine in paediatrics: a single-centre retrospective review
Zenaz Zarir Sarkari1, Corey Fish2
1University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, USA.
Insights
Telemedicine offers potential for pediatric care access but has limitations for urgent situations. A review found few in-person visits could be diagnosed and treated remotely, highlighting the need for better pediatric remote care tools.
Area of Science:
- Pediatric Healthcare
- Telemedicine Technology
- Digital Health
Background:
- Telemedicine adoption is increasing across healthcare, including pediatrics.
- While expanding access, current telemedicine limitations raise concerns for direct replacement of in-person pediatric care, especially in acute settings.
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the suitability of telemedicine for definitive diagnosis and treatment in pediatric acute/urgent care settings.
- To identify limitations of current telemedicine for direct replacement of in-person pediatric visits.
Main Methods:
- Retrospective review of in-person pediatric visits.
- Analysis of cases to determine if telemedicine would have allowed definitive diagnosis and treatment.
Main Results:
- Only a small percentage of in-person pediatric visits were deemed suitable for definitive diagnosis and treatment via telemedicine.
- Significant limitations exist for using current telemedicine in acute or urgent pediatric care.
Conclusions:
- Current telemedicine is not a suitable replacement for in-person pediatric care in acute/urgent settings.
- Development of improved data collection and tools is necessary for effective pediatric remote care implementation.
Abstract:
Recent advancements and adoption of telemedicine have affected all aspects of healthcare including paediatrics. While telemedicine has the potential to increase access to paediatric care, the limitations of this service in its current iteration bring into question its usefulness for direct replacement of in-person care, particularly in an acute or urgent care setting. This retrospective review demonstrates that only a small percentage of in-person visits to our practice would have resulted in definitive diagnosis and treatment if facilitated via telemedicine. There is a need for better and more widespread data collection techniques and tools suitable for paediatric remote care implementation before telemedicine becomes a useful diagnostic and treatment tool in an acute or urgent care setting.
