Utilization of telehealth services in low- and middle-income countries amid the COVID-19 pandemic: a narrative summary

Abstract

Background During the current period of the pandemic, telehealth has been a boon to the healthcare system by providing quality healthcare services at a safe social distance. However, there has been slow progress in telehealth services in low- and middle-income countries with little to no evidence of the cost and effectiveness of such programmes. Objective To provide an overview of the expansion of telehealth in low- and middle-income countries amid the COVID-19 pandemic and identify the challenges, benefits, and costs associated with implementing telehealth services in these countries. Methods We performed a literature review using the search term: ‘*country name* AND ((telemedicine[Title][Abstract]) OR (telehealth[Title][Abstract] OR eHealth[Title][Abstract] OR mHealth[Title][Abstract]))’. Initially, we started with 467 articles, which were reduced to 140 after filtering out duplicates and including only primary research studies. Next, these articles were screened based on established inclusion criteria and 44 articles were finalised to be used in the review. Results We found telehealth-specific software being used as the most common tool to provide such services. Nine articles reported patient satisfaction of greater than 90% with telehealth services. Moreover, the articles identified the ability to make a correct diagnosis to resolve the condition, efficient mobilisation of healthcare resources, increased accessibility for patients, increased service utilisation, and increased satisfaction as benefits of telehealth services, whereas inaccessibility, low technological literacy, and lack of support, poor security standards and technological concerns, loss of interest by the patients, and income impacts on physicians as challenges. The review could not find articles that explored the financial information on telehealth programme implementation. Conclusion Although telehealth services are growing in popularity, the research gap on the efficacy of telehealth is high in low- and middle-income countries. To better guide the future development of telehealth services, rigorous economic evaluation of telehealth is needed.

Digital health interventions for suicide prevention among LGBTQ: A narrative review

“…These trends denote that digital health interventions are widely implemented in developed countries, which are resource-rich settings. This can be potentially attributed to general perceptions that low-and-middle-income countries (LMIC) face difficulties adopting technology-based interventions due to less digital-friendly policies, limited internet access, data insecurity challenges, and privacy threats [21][22][23]. However, recent progress in digital accessibility in LMICs offers promising opportunities to bridge the technological disparities and promote global digital health equity [21,22,24].…”

“…This can be potentially attributed to general perceptions that low-and-middle-income countries (LMIC) face difficulties adopting technology-based interventions due to less digital-friendly policies, limited internet access, data insecurity challenges, and privacy threats [21][22][23]. However, recent progress in digital accessibility in LMICs offers promising opportunities to bridge the technological disparities and promote global digital health equity [21,22,24]. Institutional support is required in many LMICs to overcome these challenges and develop and consolidate digital health strategies [25,26].…”