Use of General Practitioner Telehealth Services During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Regional Victoria, Australia: Retrospective Analysis

Abstract

Background In March 2020, the Australian Government expanded general practitioner (GP) telehealth services in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Objective This study sought to assess use patterns of GP telehealth services in response to changing circumstances (before and during the COVID-19 pandemic and with or without a lockdown) in regional Victoria, Australia. Methods We conducted a secondary analysis of monthly Medicare claims data from July 2019 to June 2021 from 140 regional GP practices in Western Victoria. The longitudinal patterns of proportion of GP telehealth consultations stratified by type of consultation (ie, videoconference vs telephone) and by geographical, consumer, and consultation characteristics were analyzed. Results Telehealth comprised 25.8% (522,932/2,025,615) of GP consultations over the 2-year period. After the introduction of the Australian telehealth expansion policy in March 2020, there was a rapid uptake in GP telehealth services (including telephone and video services), from 0% before COVID-19 to 15% (11,854/80,922) of all consultations in March 2020, peaking at 55% (50,828/92,139) in August 2020. Thereafter, the use of telehealth declined steadily to 31% (23,941/77,344) in January 2021 and tapered off to 28% (29,263/103,798) in June 2021. Telephone services and shorter consultations were the most dominant form, and those aged 15-64 years had higher telehealth use rates than younger or older age groups. The proportion of video consultations was higher during periods with government-imposed lockdowns and higher in the most socioeconomically advantaged areas compared to less socioeconomically advantaged areas. Conclusions Our findings support the continuation of telehealth use in rural and regional Australia post pandemic. Future policy must identify mechanisms to reduce existing equity gaps in video consultations and consider patient- and system-level implications of the dominant use of short telephone consultations.

Use of Video in Telephone Triage in Out-of-Hours Primary Care: Register-Based Study

“…To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to report on associations between patient- and contact-related characteristics and video contacts in OOH-PC. Studies conducted in daytime general practice have found higher video rates of use during COVID-19 lockdown periods [ 34 ] and among people from socioeconomically advantaged areas [ 34 35 ]. Previous studies have reported inconsistent results on the association between patient age and video use, as higher use has been reported for both younger [ 32 35 ] and older patients [ 30 ].…”

Gastrointestinal specialist perspectives on telehealth consultations

“…Consequently, a significant and rapid increase in telehealth use occurred, accounting for 28% of all federally funded consultations, compared to <1% prior to the pandemic (Bate et al, 2021;Taylor et al, 2021). Multiple studies have noted that there has in fact been greater utilisation of telephone consultations compared to videoconferencing (Imlach et al, 2020;Savira et al, 2023;Wiadji et al, 2021). In their paper that analysed patterns of telemedicine usage, stratified by the type of technology (e.g., videoconferencing versus telephone consults), Savira et al found that telephone consultations made up more than 98% of all remote consultations (Savira et al, 2023).…”

“…Multiple studies have noted that there has in fact been greater utilisation of telephone consultations compared to videoconferencing (Imlach et al, 2020;Savira et al, 2023;Wiadji et al, 2021). In their paper that analysed patterns of telemedicine usage, stratified by the type of technology (e.g., videoconferencing versus telephone consults), Savira et al found that telephone consultations made up more than 98% of all remote consultations (Savira et al, 2023). This surge in telehealth use, particularly with telephone consults but also with videoconferencing, has been pivotal in providing continuity in clinical care to patients during the pandemic and has been quickly embraced by a variety of healthcare providers such as general practitioners, specialists, and allied health providers (Elawady et al, 2020;Ly et al, 2017;Malliaras et al, 2021).…”

Comparison of Telephone and Video Telehealth Consultations: Systematic Review

“…In Australia, following a rapid national policy response to the COVID-19 pandemic, uptake of telehealth consultations increased sharply and effectively [ 1 ]. In state of Victoria, telehealth consultations with general practitioners increased from 0% before the pandemic to 55% by August 2020 and tapered off to stay around 30% thereafter [ 2 ]. The most common types of consultations through telehealth were management of chronic conditions, mental health, and medication, posttest and postdischarge follow-ups, and new patient consultations [ 3 ].…”