COVID-19: The Changing Trend of Tele-consultations in a Private Tertiary Level Health Facility in Tanzania

Abstract

<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title> <jats:p><jats:bold>Introduction:</jats:bold> The current COVID-19 pandemic has occasioned the increased adoption of telemedicine. This study reports the uptake and trend of a new teleconsultation service in a Tanzanian hospital.<jats:bold>Methods: </jats:bold>This is a retrospective observational study that profiled requests for teleconsultations and uptake of the service between April 1, 2020, and June 30, 2020.<jats:bold>Results:</jats:bold> Two hundred and eighteen telephone inquiries were received over the 3 months. One hundred and sixteen (53.2%) individuals followed through with the teleconsultations. Paediatric (38.8%) and Internal medicine (32.8%) were the subspecialties with the highest number of teleconsultations. In a frame of 3 months, teleconsultation uptake was highest in May and lowest in June.<jats:bold>Conclusion: </jats:bold>There was a steady rise and a rapid fall in requests and uptake of teleconsultation services over the period under evaluation. Lack of insurance coverage for teleconsultations was a significant barrier. We propose a re-education and reiteration of the benefits of telemedicine to all stakeholders. This is important for the current era and beyond.</jats:p>

Utility of telemedicine in sub‐Saharan Africa during the COVID ‐19 pandemic. A rapid review

“…All these studies were reported in 2020 during the COVID 19 outbreak. Two articles were cross‐sectional surveys (Armand et al, 2021 ; Feldman et al, 2021 ), one was a randomized controlled trial (Owolabi et al, 2020 ), one was a news article (Adebayo et al, 2020 ), one was a narrative review from Kenya (Jaguga & Kwobah, 2020 ), two were observational studies (Adebayo et al, 2021 ; Nlemadim et al, 2021 ), two were letters (Balme et al, 2020 ; Moolla et al, 2020 ), one was a commentary (Kamulegeya et al, 2020 ) and the other one was a retrospective and prospective analysis (Moyo & Madziyire, 2020 ).…”

“…The review showed the utilization of telemedicine in Zimbabwe, Cameroon, Uganda, South Africa, Nigeria, Mozambique, Tanzania, and Kenya. The most utilized mode of engaging patients was the telephones (P. Adebayo et al, 2020 ; Armand et al, 2021 ; Balme et al, 2020 ; Kamulegeya et al, 2020 ) and (Feldman et al, 2021 ). Two studies made use of the social media platform Whatsapp (Armand et al, 2021 ; Moyo & Madziyire, 2020 ) while some employed virtual platforms and video calls such as Skype (Armand et al, 2021 ; Moolla et al, 2020 ).…”

“…In Kenya, a virtual online training program provided the scarce mental health professionals with the opportunity to receive psychological first aid training to successfully counsel those in need during lockdowns and beyond (Jaguga & Kwobah, 2020 ). Teleconsultations in Tanzania helped in successfully reaching 118 patients after 216 inquiries; and 45 pediatric consultations despite the distance barrier to the service provider (P. Adebayo et al, 2020 ). A randomized controlled trial in South Africa indicated moderate improved adherence levels to medication by diabetics (Owolabi et al, 2020 ).…”

“…Adepoju ( 2020 ) states that South Africa introduced the m‐Health policy in 2015 with no guidance on the use of telemedicine for the delivery of mental healthcare. Also, a retrospective observational study by P. Adebayo et al ( 2020 ) revealed that lack of insurance approval for teleconsultation was the reason for not booking a teleconsultation in private tertiary level health facilities in Tanzania. This is exacerbated by the lack of insurance coverage for teleconsultations and companies failing to reimburse physicians embarked in teleconsultations, as it becomes an indispensable and highly valuable tool during the pandemic.…”

“…This is exacerbated by the lack of insurance coverage for teleconsultations and companies failing to reimburse physicians embarked in teleconsultations, as it becomes an indispensable and highly valuable tool during the pandemic. Also, Adepoju ( 2020 ) and P. Adebayo et al ( 2020 ) revealed that low awareness for telemedicine and unwillingness to explore other modalities of consultations were major challenges and barriers to the effective utilization of telemedicine. However, there are opportunities for improvement and alleviating these barriers which include sensitization of the community and health workers to improve awareness and willingness to utilize telemedicine products during the pandemic.…”