Telemedicine in Spine Surgery: Outcomes for 138 Patients With Virtual Preoperative Assessment Compared to Historical Controls

A rapid review of the effectiveness of remote consultations versus face-to-face consultations in secondary care surgical outpatient settings

“…However, in Ye et al’s study (2022) the telemedicine cohort experienced significantly longer time between the initial appointment and surgery (TMC: 44 days; IPC: 33 days; p<0.05) compared with the in-person cohort. Greven et al (2022) found no significant differences in readmission (TMC: 7.9%; IPC: 4.3%; p>0.05) or reoperations rates (TMC: 10.1%; IPC: 5.1%; p>0.05) for spine surgery candidates evaluated pre-operatively by telemedicine compared to in-person.…”

“…In three studies, one cohort was used (Choi et al 2022, Crawford et al 2021, Lightsey et al 2021), and the patients’ initial telemedicine consultation was compared to a second in-person consultation. In seven studies, two cohort groups (telemedicine and in-person) were compared (Aldawoodi et al 2021, Natale et al 2022, Raad et al 2021, Ye et al 2022, Lightsey et al 2021, Uppal et al 2022, Greven et al 2022, Henry et al 2022) and in one additional study, three cohorts were compared (Sibanda et al 2021). Comparison groups either contained participants who were chosen from a sample receiving in-person consultation during COVID or pre COVID historical patient pools.…”

“…Five studies reported on the use of telemedicine consultations for pre-operative appointments (Crawford et al 2021, Lightsey et al 2021, Greven et al 2022, Ye et al 2022, Natale et al 2022), two studies for postoperative appointments (Uppal et al 2022, Henry et al 2022), two studies across initial and postoperative appointments (Raad et al 2021, Sibanda et al 2021) and one study for pre-anaesthesia evaluations (Aldawoodi et al 2021). Three studies conducted the consultation via both video conferencing and telephone calls (Uppal et al 2022, Henry et al 2022, Sibanda et al 2021), two studies via video conferencing (Choi et al 2022, Aldawoodi et al 2021) and two studies via telephone calls (Natale et al 2022, Raad et al 2021).…”

“…Numbers of participants across the studies ranged from 33 (Lightsey et al 2021) to 535 (Uppal et al 2022). Four studies were conducted with patients who were undergoing a variety of orthopaedic surgical procedures (Crawford et al 2021, Henry et al 2022, Raad et al 2021, Sibanda et al 2021), three studies for spine surgery (Lightsey et al 2021, Greven et al 2022, Ye et al 2022), two studies for cancer-related surgery (Aldawoodi et al 2021, Uppal et al 2022) and one study each for circumcision (Natale et al 2022) or laryngology-related complaints (Choi et al 2022).…”

“…Fives studies provided confidence intervals (Q1.14) (Choi et al 2022, Crawford et al 2021, Lightsey et al 2021, Natale et al 2022, Uppal et al 2022) and one further study provided confidence intervals for one of the outcomes but not for the others, so this had to be scored a ‘No’ (Raad et al 2021). Overall, five of the retrospective cohort studies were rated as being of low quality reflecting that either most criteria were not met, or that there were significant flaws relating to key aspects of study design (Aldawoodi et al 2021, Greven et al 2022, Raad et al 2021, Sibanda et al 2021, Ye et al 2022). This means that conclusions are likely to change in the light of further studies.…”