The Use of Telemedicine in Older Patients with Gastrointestinal Diseases

Abstract

Purpose of Review The COVID-19 pandemic helped us understand that telemedicine provides an alternative way to manage patients remotely, with an added benefit of saving time and travel costs. However, barriers may exist in an older population of patients such as inadequate technology availability and knowledge, and lack of internet connectivity. This systematic review and analysis of data at an academic medical center examines the current literature and investigates the efficacy of telemedicine for older adults requiring gastrointestinal care. Recent Findings In the systematic review, we included 22 manuscripts from an initial 120 that were identified based on inclusion and exclusion criteria. In this existing literature, telemedicine visits were equivalent or better than in-person visits based on many metrics, including patient satisfaction, time and money saved, and standard patient outcomes. At a rural academic medical center, there was a steady decrease in the failure rate of telemedicine visits from April 2020 to May 2022 in all age groups, including the 65 + age group, from 17% in April 2020 to 3% in May 2022. Summary Telemedicine offers a comparable alternative to in-person visits that is convenient, low-cost, and does not compromise quality of care for older patients obtaining GI care. The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated progress and uptake of telemedicine, and the successful use by all ages including older patients opens the broader conversation about the continued use of telemedicine for care in various areas of medicine.

Inflammatory Bowel Disease Hospitalizations Are Similar for Patients Receiving Televisit-Delivered Outpatient Care and Those Receiving Traditional In-Person Care

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A Qualitative Analysis of Community Participants’ Experiences with a Virtual Interprofessional Team Visit (vIPTV) with Healthcare Students

“…Research shows people are more comfortable with telehealth and receiving care from home. 10 Older adults had a positive attitude toward technology use in healthcare, but still preferred face-to-face interactions with healthcare professionals in-person. 11 Community participants in the vIPTV program reported challenges with difficulty to get to know students on video due to non-verbal communication cues and reported meeting virtually felt less meaningful compared to in-person visits.…”

Telemedicine in inflammatory bowel diseases: A new brick in the medicine of the future?

“…Unsurprisingly, another study showed that younger patients were more prone to use telemedicine[ 27 ]. However, other evidence has shown encouraging results regarding the involvement of older adults in telemedicine systems, especially with the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic[ 28 ].…”