Telemedicine in practical dermatovenerology

Abstract

Aim to evaluate the effectiveness of providing specialized dermatovenerological care using remote telemedicine consultations to patients of the Samara region with chronic dermatoses: psoriasis, atopic dermatitis, eczema.
 Material and methods. We performed a comparative analysis of telemedicine consultations in real time in 53 adult patients with confirmed clinical diagnoses who were on inpatient and outpatient treatment. The results were evaluated by the duration of clinical remission and indicators of the Dermatology Life Quality Index (DLQI) 12 months after the start of treatment.The telemedicine consultations were conducted in the Unified Medical Information and Analytical System of the Samara Region (EMIAS) using the integrated video conferencing service (VCS) TrueConf version 7.5.
 Results. We noted the clinical effectiveness of telemedicine consultations in patients with chronic recurrent dermatoses. The duration of clinical remission significantly increased from 3.1 0.7 months to 5.7 0.4 months (p 0.05). In the comparison group, this indicator did not significantly differ (p = 0.05) from the initial one (3.2 0.1 months and 3.3 0.6 months). According to the results of the telemedicine consultations, the DLQ index had improved by an average of 45.1% and amounted to 12.4 1.8 points from the initial 22.6 1.6 points (p 0.05). The treatment compliance increased in 58.5% of patients (31 people), of which 81% (25 people) were rural residents. The remote counseling increases the availability of the medical care and satisfaction of dermatovenerological patients of the Samara region with the medical care provided.