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Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Formative Research

Date Submitted: Jan 15, 2021
Date Accepted: May 31, 2021

The final, peer-reviewed published version of this preprint can be found here:

Health Care Professionals’ Experiences With the Use of Video Consultation: Qualitative Study

Christensen NP, Skou KE, Danbjørg DB

Health Care Professionals’ Experiences With the Use of Video Consultation: Qualitative Study

JMIR Form Res 2021;5(7):e27094

DOI: 10.2196/27094

PMID: 34287207

PMCID: 8339982

: I cannot touch you, but is that always essential: A qualitative study about health care professionals’ experiences with the use of video consultations.

  • Nina Primholdt Christensen; 
  • Karen Emilie Skou; 
  • Dorthe Boe Danbjørg

ABSTRACT

Background:

The number of remote video consultations between doctors and patients have increased during the last years and especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. The health care service is faced by rising rates of chronic illness, but also many patients who are more confident in self-management of their illness. Add to this the improved long-term outlook for serious conditions such as cancer, that might require flexibility in the everyday life.

Objective:

This study aimed to investigate how medical doctors in the out-patient clinic experience the use of video consultations with the hematological patients with focus on relational and organizational aspects.

Methods:

The study was designed as an explorative and qualitative study. Data were collected via participant observations and focus group interviews with medical doctors

Results:

The study identified possibilities and barriers in relation to adapting to the different way of meeting the patient in the clinical setting. Some of the main findings in this study are that the medical doctors were afraid that they missed important observations as they were not able to perform a physical examination, if needed. They also emphasized that the handshake and eye-contact were important in order to ascertain the overall impression of the patient’s situation. It also came clear that the medical doctors were using their body language a lot more during a video consultation compared with a consultation in normal frames. The medical doctors found the contact with the patients via the screen good and the fact that the technology was working well made them feel secure with the video consultation.

Conclusions:

In this study was found that the doctors we able to maintain good contact with the patients despite the screen and were able to sense the patient in a satisfying manner. Though there were still uncertainties among some doctors about the fact that they could not examine the patients physically. New knowledge about how to use gestures and non-verbal body language during a video consultation was also discovered.


 Citation

Please cite as:

Christensen NP, Skou KE, Danbjørg DB

Health Care Professionals’ Experiences With the Use of Video Consultation: Qualitative Study

JMIR Form Res 2021;5(7):e27094

DOI: 10.2196/27094

PMID: 34287207

PMCID: 8339982

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