Telemedicine visits comparable to in-person visits for addressing most patient clinical concern areas in primary care

Medical Xpress October 16, 2023
American College of Physicians

A study of more than 1 million adults has found that in primary care, telemedicine visits were comparable to in-person visits for addressing most patient clinical concern areas. Telemedicine visits resulted in lower treatment rates and higher rates of follow-up health care use compared with in-person office visits, but these differences were small and varied by clinical condition. The findings are published in Annals of Internal Medicine.

While telemedicine use expanded greatly during the COVID-19 pandemic, driven primarily by social distancing efforts, longer-term use of telemedicine can continue to offer patients a convenient option and expand access to primary care.

However, beyond initial pandemic-related telemedicine, there is limited evidence for whether longer-term use of telemedicine visits in clinical practice adequately...

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