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A single centre study of the level of parents’ satisfaction with the COVID-19 telemedicine consultation

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Abstract

Telemedicine is an effective tool for video consultation of COVID-19 patients in the setting of the COVID-19 pandemic. We prospectively determined the level of parents’ satisfaction with the COVID-19 telemedicine consultation. This was a single centre prospective study. COVID-19 paediatric patients who were seen in the children’s emergency department of KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital, Singapore, and deemed fit for home recovery were discharged with a COVID-19 telemedicine follow-up in two to three days’ time. Paediatric patients who were seen in the COVID-19 telemedicine visits were included in the parents’ satisfaction survey. We excluded patients who defaulted their telemedicine visits. The telemedicine satisfaction survey was conducted using an online form consisting of 16 Likert scale questions, sent via text messaging. Our primary outcome was telemedicine satisfaction scores. Our secondary outcome was children’s emergency department reattendance or hospital admission within 10 days after the telemedicine consultation. 1238 patients attended the COVID-19 video consultation clinic from 15 December 2021 till 25 March 2022, out of which 476 parents of the COVID-19 patients completed the survey questionnaire. The mean age of the COVID-19 patients was 3.6 years. There was a high level of overall satisfaction among parents of the COVID-19 patients, with a mean score of 6.1 out of 7. 12 out of 16 questions had a positive response (mean score of 6 or more). There was a total of 9 reattendances to children's emergency department, out of which 3 cases needed hospital admission.

   Conclusion: There was a high level of overall satisfaction with the use of telemedicine in symptomatic COVID-19 paediatric patients.

What is Known:

• Telemedicine is a cost-effective and feasible mode of delivering health care for conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, and depressive disorder, especially in the setting of the COVID-19 pandemic.

What is New:

• To gauge the parents’ satisfaction with the COVID-19 telemedicine visit, in order to improve the patient and caregiver experience with telemedicine, and to improve the telemedicine service delivery.

• Information from this study is crucial in order to prevent unnecessary hospital reattendance due to parental concern from poor telemedicine delivery.

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Data availability

Individual participant data that underlie the results reported in this article, after deidentification (text and tables), statistical analysis plan and analytic code are available, beginning 3 months and ending 5 years after article publication, for researchers who provide a methodologically sound proposal, in order to achieve aims in the approved proposal. Proposals should be directed to tan.lay.ong@singhealth.com.sg. To gain access, data requestors will need to sign a data access agreement. Alternatively, data requests can be sent to KK Research Centre, KK Women's and Children's Hospital, Singapore via email address: research@kkh.com.sg.

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Acknowledgements

We thank Lok Sun Sun, Selena Ng Su-Ling and Louis Teo Zhang Yi for providing administrative support in the implementation of the questionnaire survey.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Paediatrics, KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital, 100 Bukit Timah Road, Singapore, 229899, Singapore

    Lay Ong Tan

  2. Department of Emergency Medicine, KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital, Singapore, Singapore

    Sashikumar Ganapathy

  3. Duke-NUS Medical School, Singapore, Singapore

    Sashikumar Ganapathy

Authors
  1. Lay Ong Tan
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  2. Sashikumar Ganapathy
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Contributions

Lay Ong Tan: Contributed to conception and design; contributed to acquisition and analysis; drafted manuscript; agrees to be accountable for all aspects of work ensuring integrity and accuracy. Sashikumar Ganapathy: Contributed to conception; contributed to interpretation; critically revised manuscript; gave final approval; agrees to be accountable for all aspects of work ensuring integrity and accuracy.

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Correspondence to Lay Ong Tan.

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Ethics approval

The study was approved by the Singhealth Centralised Institutional Review Board (CIRB Ref: 2021/2767), and the study was granted waiver of documentation of informed consent based on ethical consideration. The study was performed in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki.

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information

Communicated by Tobias Tenenbaum

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Tan, L.O., Ganapathy, S. A single centre study of the level of parents’ satisfaction with the COVID-19 telemedicine consultation. Eur J Pediatr 183, 213–218 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00431-023-05276-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00431-023-05276-7

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