Current public health measures catalyzed a large shift to virtual care, resulting in a great uptake in telephone and video-enabled care. While pre-pandemic public healthcare funding rarely covered the telephone as a reimbursable care delivery model, it has proven a crucial offering for many populations. As the new standard of virtual service delivery is being solidified, simple technological solutions that provide access to care must continue to be supported. This paper explores an important consequence of relying on complex technologies as the new standard of virtual care: the risk of exacerbating health disparities by enabling a deeper digital divide for marginalized populations.

Background The rapid virtualization of health services during the COVID-19 pandemic has drawn increasing attention to the impact of virtual care technologies on health equity. In some circumstances, virtual care initiatives have been shown to increase health disparities, as individuals from underserved communities are less likely to benefit from such initiatives. Objective The purpose of this paper is to describe a protocol for a scoping review of reviews that aims to map review-level evidence that describes challenges and strategies for promoting effective engagement with virtual care technologies among underserved communities. Methods Our methodology was adapted from seminal scoping review guidelines provided by Arksey and O’Malley, Levac at al, Colquhoun et al, and the Joanna Briggs Institute. Our search strategy was developed for the following databases: MEDLINE (on Ovid), EMBASE (on Ovid), CINAHL (on EBSCO), Scopus, and Epistemonikos. Supplementary searches will include the use of Google Scholar and reference tracking. Each citation will be independently screened by 2 researchers at the title and abstract level, and full-text screening will be performed in accordance with our eligibility criteria. The eligibility criteria focused on the inclusion of methods-driven reviews (ie, systematic reviews, scoping reviews, meta-analyses, realist reviews, and critical interpretative syntheses) to enhance rigor and quality. Other inclusion criteria included a focus on virtual care services that facilitate bidirectional patient-provider communication (ie, video, telephone, and asynchronous messaging visits) for underserved populations (ie, those who experience social disadvantage due to race, age, income, and other factors related to the social determinants of health). Results This scoping review of reviews will provide a broad overview of identified challenges associated with the accessibility of virtual health care services among underserved communities. In addition, strategies for improving the access to, uptake of, and engagement with virtual care technologies among underserved communities will be identified. The knowledge synthesized from this review will aid in developing and implementing virtual services that acknowledge the unique needs of populations who experience barriers to care and disproportionately worse health outcomes. The results will also inform gaps in current research. Conclusions The rapid shift toward virtual health services has highlighted the urgent need to critically examine the intersection of virtual care and health equity. Although technology-driven innovations in health care generally aim to improve access, quality, and health outcomes, it is also possible for these innovations to produce intervention-generated inequities. Assessing current review-level evidence on the key challenges and strategies for improving the application of virtual care in underserved communities is imperative for ensuring that virtual care benefits all populations. International Registered Report Identifier (IRRID) PRR1-10.2196/22847

Background Task sharing has been used worldwide to improve access to mental health care, where nonspecialist providers—individuals with no formal training in mental health—have been trained to effectively treat perinatal depressive and anxiety symptoms. Little formative research has been conducted to examine relevant barriers and facilitators of nonspecialist providers and the use of telemedicine in treatment service delivery. Objective The primary objective of this study was to examine the main barriers and facilitators of nonspecialist provider–delivered psychological treatments for perinatal populations with common mental health disorders, such as depression and anxiety, from a multistakeholder perspective. Methods This study took place in Toronto, Canada. In total, 33 in-depth interviews were conducted with multiple stakeholder groups (women with lived experience and their significant others, as well as health and mental health professionals). Qualitative data were quantified to estimate commonly endorsed themes within and across stakeholder groups. Results Psychological treatments delivered by nonspecialist providers were considered acceptable by the vast majority of participants (30/33, 90%). Across all stakeholder groups, nurses (20/33, 61%) and midwives (14/33, 42%) were the most commonly endorsed cadre of nonspecialist providers. The majority of stakeholders (32/33, 97%) were amenable to nonspecialist providers delivering psychological treatment via telemedicine (27/33, 82%), although concerns were raised about the ability to establish a therapeutic alliance via telemedicine (16/33, 48%). Empathy was the most desired characteristic of a nonspecialist provider (61%). Patient and patient advocate stakeholders were more likely to emphasize stigma as an important barrier to accessing psychological treatments (7/12, 58%), compared to clinicians (2/9, 22%) and spouses (1/5, 20%). Clinician stakeholders were more likely to emphasize the importance of ensuring nonspecialist providers were trained to deliver psychological treatments (3/9, 33%), compared to other stakeholder groups. Conclusions These results can inform the design, implementation, and integration of nonspecialist-delivered interventions via telemedicine for women with perinatal depressive and anxiety symptoms in high-income country contexts.

Objective We sought to understand and synthesize review-level evidence on the challenges associated with accessibility of virtual care among underserved population groups and to identify strategies that can improve access to, uptake of, and engagement with virtual care for these populations. Materials and Methods A scoping review of reviews was conducted (protocol available at doi: 10.2196/22847). A total of 14 028 records were retrieved from MEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, Scopus, and Epistemonikos databases. Data were abstracted, and challenges and strategies were identified and summarized for each underserved population group and across population groups. Results A total of 37 reviews were included. Commonly occurring challenges and strategies were grouped into 6 key thematic areas based on similarities across communities: (1) the person’s orientation toward health-related needs, (2) the person’s orientation toward health-related technology, (3) the person’s digital literacy, (4) technology design, (5) health system structure and organization, and (6) social and structural determinants of access to technology-enabled care. We suggest 4 important directions for policy development: (1) investment in digital health literacy education and training, (2) inclusive digital health technology design, (3) incentivizing inclusive digital health care, and (4) investment in affordable and accessible infrastructure. Discussion and Conclusion Challenges associated with accessibility of virtual care among underserved population groups can occur at the individual, technological, health system, and social/structural determinant levels. Although the policy approaches suggested by our review are likely to be difficult to achieve in a given policy context, they are essential to a more equitable future for virtual care.