Tele-rehabilitation for visually challenged students during COVID-19 pandemic

Senjam, Suraj Singh; Manna, Souvik; Vashist, Praveen; Gupta, Vivek; Varughese, Sara; Tandon, Radhika

doi:10.4103/ijo.ijo_2527_20

Cited by 15 publications

(20 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…Several articles ( n = 16, 29.6%) recognized telemedicine as a promising option to compensate for doctors' limited availability ( 6 , 7 , 31 , 35 – 47 ). Also, several others ( n = 13, 24.0%) identified telemedicine as a preventive method for reducing physical interactions and hence lowering the risk of patients contracting COVID-19 ( 48 – 50 ) Some studies ( n = 9, 16.7%) reported lowering the risk for healthcare workers ( 6 , 24 , 26 , 35 , 44 , 48 , 50 , 51 ), others ( n = 4, 7.4%) emphasized telemedicine's need to address disparities in healthcare worker distribution and high healthcare costs ( 40 , 42 , 47 , 51 , 52 ). Telemedicine was an important aspect to avoid a shortage of personal protective equipment (PPE) in healthcare facilities ( n = 4, 7.4%) ( 6 , 11 , 23 , 25 , 39 , 41 , 43 ).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Telemedicine in Low- and Middle-Income Countries During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Scoping Review

Mahmoud

Jaramillo

Barteit

2022

Front. Public Health

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BackgroundCOVID-19 has impacted the capacity of healthcare systems worldwide, particularly in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), which are already under strain due to population growth and insufficient resources. Since the COVID-19 pandemic's emergence, there has been an urgent need for a rapid and adequate reaction to the pandemic's disruption of healthcare systems. To this end, telemedicine has been shown in prior research to be a feasible approach. The overarching objective of this scoping review was to determine the extent and acceptance of telemedicine in healthcare in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) during the COVID-19 pandemic.MethodsThis scoping review followed PRISMA guidelines and Arksey and O'Malley's five-stage framework to identify available evidence. We systematically searched four academic databases for peer-reviewed literature published between January 2020 and April 2021: Medline, PubMed, Web of Science, and Scopus, as well as Google Scholar as a source for grey literature.ResultsThe search identified 54 articles with 45,843 participants, including 6,966 healthcare professionals and 36,877 healthcare users. We identified a range of reasons for introducing telemedicine in LMICs during COVID-19, most notably to maintain non-emergency healthcare, enhance access to healthcare providers, and reduce the risk of infection among health users and providers. Overall, healthcare providers and users have shown a high level of acceptance for telemedicine services. During the COVID-19 pandemic, telemedicine provided access to healthcare in the majority of included articles. Nonetheless, some challenges to accepting telemedicine as a method of healthcare delivery have been reported, including technological, regulatory, and economical challenges.ConclusionTelemedicine was found to improve access to high-quality healthcare and decrease infection risk in LMICs during COVID-19. In general, infrastructure and regulatory barriers found to be the most significant barriers to wider telemedicine use, and should be considered when implementing telemedicine more broadly. There appears to be a need to prioritize patient data safety, as many healthcare practitioners utilized commercial apps and services as telemedicine systems. Additionally, it appears as though there is a need to increase capacity, skill, and transparency, as well as to educate patients about telemedicine.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Telemedicine in Low- and Middle-Income Countries During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Scoping Review

Mahmoud

Jaramillo

Barteit

2022

Front. Public Health

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“…Smartphones also helped in psychological counselling for fear, facilitating and addressing many unseen challenges faced by visually disabled people during the lockdown period. 35…”

Section: Dovepressmentioning

confidence: 99%

Smartphones-Based Assistive Technology: Accessibility Features and Apps for People with Visual Impairment, and its Usage, Challenges, and Usability Testing

Senjam¹,

Manna²,

Bascarán³

2021

OPTO

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Smartphones are less likely to be considered as assistive technology for visual impairment among a large majority of health care providers, excluding vision rehabilitation professionals, and the general public who are not familiar with accessible features and apps. The present review aims to highlight accessible features and apps along with usages, including educational, and access to smartphones as assistive technology for visual impairment and blindness. It also includes advantages and challenges faced by users, and usability testing by app developers. There have been significant recent developments in mobile technology that incorporate computer technology relating to electronic information, communication, and touch-screen accessibility. Such advances in technology are transforming the use of smartphones from a traditional visual interface to a truly visual free interaction using alternative body senses, such as haptic, gesture, and so on. There are many built-in accessible features and third-party accessible applications that enable people with visual impairment to perform daily activities, independent functioning, movement, social inclusion and participation, education, etc. They are universally designed, so they are unlikely to induce social stigma or negative reactions from peers or public. Healthcare practitioners, not limiting to eye care, and caregivers, family members, teachers, or special educators should be informed about the potential uses and benefits of smartphones for visually impaired in developing nations. Evidence shows that most of the users train by themselves. Enhancing the awareness along with training for teachers and caregivers would be helpful to improve access and skills among users with visual disabilities. Developers are continuously producing more innovative applications for visual impairment, which indicates the need for having a training guideline on the use of smartphones.

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“…Senjam et al report on successful TR for the visually impaired during the COVID-19 lockdown. 66 In another publication, the Institute for Vision Rehabilitation at LV Prasad Eye Institute, Hyderabad, South India, used a TR approach. 67 In the study, 250 volunteers helped with content development, voice recording, fundraising, translation of educational materials, and other measures.…”

Section: Telerehabilitation In Indiamentioning

confidence: 99%

Telerehabilitation: An Overview

Ganapathy¹

2021

TMT

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Rehabilitation is a major component of health sciences, and is the process of restoring an incapacitated individual to a normal life through training and therapy. Globally, 2.4 billion people may currently require rehabilitation. In 60 to 70% of countries, existing rehabilitation services have been disrupted due to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Even after lockdowns and with vaccinations, some form of physical distancing is likely to be part of the new normal. Concurrently, there is an exponential growth of telehealth. This global overview will demonstrate that telerehabilitation (TR) is likely to be a distinct stand-alone sub-specialty of telehealth. Details of setting up TR, methods, and components are discussed, and clinical indications, limitations, advantages, disadvantages, challenges, and barriers to implementation and technological advances in TR are highlighted followed by an in-depth study of the literature from India.

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Tele-rehabilitation for visually challenged students during COVID-19 pandemic

Cited by 15 publications

References 23 publications

Telemedicine in Low- and Middle-Income Countries During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Scoping Review

Telemedicine in Low- and Middle-Income Countries During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Scoping Review

Smartphones-Based Assistive Technology: Accessibility Features and Apps for People with Visual Impairment, and its Usage, Challenges, and Usability Testing

Telerehabilitation: An Overview

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