Patient Preferences for Telerehabilitation Compared to In-Person Physiotherapy: A Binary Discrete Choice Experiment

To investigate the key factors that influence patients' preferences for telerehabilitation consultations in comparison to traditional in-person physiotherapy consultations and explore how these factors vary across different patient demographic characteristics.

A binary discrete choice experiment was conducted with 152 participants who had participated in physiotherapy. The primary outcome measures were the attributes related to telerehabilitation and in-person consultations, including appointment duration, cost, distance, purpose, therapist, time of day, and wait time. Participants' preferences were assessed based on their choices in the binary choice experiment.

The study did not identify any attributes of consultations that clearly influenced patients' preference for telerehabilitation versus in-person physiotherapy. There was a trend towards preferring telerehabilitation with decreased appointment wait times and lower monetary costs. Patient demographics revealed that individuals with a single chronic health condition were clearly less inclined towards telerehabilitation (OR = 0.5, 95% CI 0.27-0.93), as were those located in outer regional locations (OR = 0.34, 95% CI 0.12-0.99). Additionally, respondents preferring a short 5 km travel distance showed markedly lower preference for telerehabilitation (β_{Telerehab×Distance_5km} = -0.94, 95% CI -4.34 to -0.51, p < 0.001).

To enable broader access to physiotherapy via telerehabilitation, clinicians, and policymakers should prioritize offering timely and cost-effective sessions. The results of this study can then inform the development of telerehabilitation offerings that are better matched to patient preferences.