HOW TELEMEDICINE HAS CHANGED SURGICAL PRACTICE IN COVID PANDEMIC

Abstract

Background—The history of telemedicine parallels the history of communication and information technologies. With the advancement in information and communication technologies, telemedicine has also progressed. Still, it could not gain a respectable place in the healthcare delivery system due to lack of clear guidelines, lack of multidisciplinary approach to patient management, onerous privacy regulations, lack of reimbursement, lack of human touch in teleconsultations, and lack of integration with the national health system. There is a need to promote telemedicine services by looking into the current framework and bringing necessary changes to ease the delivery of services. Also, proper training of health care professionals about digital communication to improve patient outcome, and the introduction of telemedicine in medical education so that medical students do not suffer in the present scenario of COVID-19. Methods- We searched MEDLINE, Embase, PubMed, and PubMed Central. We used free-text terms and MeSH terms such as telemedicine, telemedicine, and COVID 19 pandemic, telemedicine and medical education, telemedicine pitfalls. Data regarding the guidelines of telemedicine and waivers during the pandemic, the current status of telemedicine in the healthcare delivery system, and its promotion during the epidemic were extracted. Finally,43 articles were found suitable to be considered for writing this evidence-based review. Results—Telemedicine has proven to be an important tool to reduce the risk of transmission of COVID 19 without hampering patient care,medical education and research. With relaxation of existing guidelines in most of the countries and training of healthcare professionals to introduce digital empathy it can be closer to a usual patient-provider encounter. Conclusion—Telemedicine cannot replace regular face to face patient-provider encounters, but it can be helpful, especially during the times of pandemics as happening during current circumstances. It should be included in the health care delivery infrastructure with all guidelines and legality to help the existing system during normal conditions and take over in need of time.