Peculiarities of outpatient care for COVID-19 patients using telemedicine technologies

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The use of telemedicine in providing outpatient care for COVID-19 patients is an integral part of the most intensively developing and promising areas of national health care. AIM: This study aims to demonstrate the efficiency of using telemedicine technologies in outpatient care for COVID-19 patients. MATERIALS AND METHODS: This study is the retrospective analysis of remote consultations for 57,256 patients with COVID-19 from April 1, 2020, to May 24, 2020. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION: The results of human resource analyses, the physician workloads, and the categories of observed patient categories are presented. The majority of patients were asymptomatic (45%), a mild form of the disease was observed in 4534 (34%) patients, and moderate cases were observed in 2800 (21%) patients. Concomitant pathology was observed in 60.0% of patients. The capacity of the telemedicine center was 52.8 patients for one physician per shift. CONCLUSIONS: The telemedicine structure of the center, which regulates the interactions of physicians with patients and other healthcare facilities, has enabled the appropriate use of human resources to ensure that therapeutic, diagnostic, and epidemiological activities are adequate and timely in outpatient settings.