(1) Background: Telemedical applications (TAs) that are centered around General practitioners’ (GP) practices could be beneficial for patients in rural areas in order to better their access to care. This could become more and more relevant as specialists favor practicing in more urban regions, leaving GPs as the first medical contact of patients in rural areas. (2) Methods: Three TAs, one synchronous, one asynchronous and one used in delegation were implemented and evaluated in ten GP practices and two specialists’ practices in rural areas of northern Germany. (3) Results: Overall satisfaction with the TAs was generally high. GPs as well as specialists were especially satisfied with asynchronous TAs. A number of valuable “Lesson learned” were obtained and can be used as recommendations for further studies, e.g., taking time to identify market-ready technologies prior to implementation, developing dedicated trainings for users, and preparation of a technical support plan. Overall, the benefits of the TAs were rated high for the patients by the medical professionals. (4) Conclusion: Especially asynchronous TAs that are based on existing technology can be successfully implemented into a developing digital health care system such as the one in Germany. The impact on treatment of those TAs needs to be further investigated.

Zusammenfassung Ziel der Studie Seit 2018 ist das Fernbehandlungsverbot gelockert. Die SARS-CoV-2 Pandemie sorgte für einen erheblichen Implementierungsschub von Videosprechstunden als Teil der Telemedizin in der hausärztlichen Versorgung. Die Frage, wie die Qualität dieser Versorgungsform abgebildet werden kann, ist bisher unbeantwortet. Daher war es Ziel dieses Reviews erste Kriterien, zur Erhebung der Qualität von Videosprechstunden in der hausärztlichen Versorgung, zu identifizieren. Methoden Im Rahmen des Reviews wurde eine Literaturrecherche in den Datenbanken PubMed, Web of Science, Google Scholar, Open Grey und Google durchgeführt. Gesucht wurde nach Literatur zu Qualitätskriterien oder -indikatoren für Videosprechstunden. Es wurde deutsch- und englischsprachige Literatur eingeschlossen, eine zeitliche Limitierung gab es nicht. Ergebnisse Durch die Literaturrecherche konnten 14 Publikationen für das Review eingeschlossen werden. Aus den dort beschriebenen Qualitätskriterien wurden 13 mögliche Qualitätsindikatoren abgeleitet. Sieben davon für die Strukturqualität, zwei für Prozess- und vier Indikatoren für die Ergebnisqualität. Unter anderem wurde der Umstieg auf Face-to-Face Behandlung, bei den Fällen, für die es erforderlich ist, die Qualifikation des Personals sowie der Zugang zu dieser Art der Versorgung als mögliche Indikatoren identifiziert. Schlussfolgerung Die in dieser Arbeit vorgeschlagenen Qualitätsindikatoren ermöglichen durch ihre Messbarkeit eine strukturierte Evaluation der Qualität von Videosprechstunden in der hausärztlichen Versorgung. Eine Weiterentwicklung dieser Indikatoren, um Schwellenwerte für die angegebenen Ziele zu definieren, erscheint sinnvoll.

Background Healthcare providers’ inclination to seek or lead other providers’ opinions on clinical topics may influence healthcare practices, particularly regarding their alignment across different providers in controversial domains. This study aimed to explore opinion-seeking behaviours of general practitioners and their impacts on clinical opinions in ambulatory cardiovascular care in Germany. Methods Between 2019 and 2021, we performed a written survey in two samples of general practitioners and one sample of self-employed cardiologists in three German states. The general practitioners were asked to identify a person they deemed influential on their views on cardiovascular conditions. Their self-perceived opinion leadership and opinion seeking behaviours were then measured, using a validated 12-item-questionnaire. General practitioners and cardiologists were requested to indicate their agreement with three potentially controversial aspects of cardiovascular ambulatory care. Potential impacts on the general practitioners’ views, including local cardiologists’ opinions, were examined using multi-level linear regression models. Results A total of 129 general practitioners and 113 cardiologists returned the questionnaire. 68.50% of general practitioners named an opinion leader, mainly cardiologists outside of their practice. General practitioners perceived themselves as opinion seeking and as opinion leading at the same time. Views on the presented controversial topics were mixed among both general practitioners and cardiologists. Self-reported opinion leadership behaviour of general practitioners was associated with their views on one of the three topics. No such associations were found for opinion seeking behaviours and the views of local cardiologists. Conclusion While most general practitioners named a cardiovascular opinion leader and saw themselves as opinion seeking regarding cardiovascular issues, they simultaneously perceived themselves as opinion leading, suggesting that opinion leadership and opinion seeking are not mutually exclusive concepts. The views of local cardiologists were not associated with the general practitioners’ view, suggesting that local medical specialists do not necessarily influence the surrounding opinion seekers’ views per se. Trial registration: We registered the study prospectively on 7 November 2019 at the German Clinical Trials Register (DRKS, www.drks.de) under ID no. DRKS00019219.