More patients are using virtual visits and chatbots to access healthcare during the coronavirus outbreak, suggesting a tip toward more healthcare consumerism.
The outbreak of the novel coronavirus is propelling healthcare consumerism, pushing new patients to adopt the patient engagement technologies that experts have long said will herald in a new era in the medical industry, according to new survey data from IDC.
Healthcare consumerism is a key industry buzzword born out of increased patient financial responsibility, a push for more patient engagement, and the prevalence of patient-facing healthcare tools.
As patients held more of a financial stake in their own health and wellness, they took ownership of their own care, theoretically jumping on the patient engagement bandwagon and adopting the health technologies clinicians offered along with it.
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And although healthcare consumerism has somewhat come to fruition — patients do front more of the money for their healthcare because of the rise in high-deductible health plans, and therefore engage in healthcare more like a customer than a patient — the rest of that picture hasn’t entirely materialized.
Patient engagement and outreach remains a challenge, and although consumers have expressed interest, adoption of engagement tools like virtual care or telehealth options has remained tepid.
“[P]rior to COVID-19 the use of virtual care has been limited to certain age cohorts or season. Younger consumers valuing convenience over a personal relationship with a primary care physician for example,” IDC Health Insights Research Vice President Lynne Dunbrack said in an emailed statement.
This latest data from an IDC survey of 1,515 adult patients in the US shows that these trends may be about to change, and the coronavirus outbreak is to thank for that. As concern for coronavirus grows among the consumer and provider base, both stakeholders are turning to largely consumer-oriented patient engagement technology to take control of their own health.
“The pandemic is a pivotal moment for telehealth and virtual visits as healthcare organizations, payers, and even employers are promoting these services to consumers who are that they have been exposed or have COVID-19 and not the flu. Using these services minimizes exposure to other patients and healthcare providers,” Dunbrack explained.
“Physician practices are also turning to telehealth services to continue to see their patients for other conditions who are concerned about being exposed to COVID-19 in waiting rooms or simply by just leaving their homes.”
Most patients are concerned about getting COVID-19, the survey showed. About 32 percent said they were concerned about the coronavirus, while 54.1 percent said they are very concerned.
Older patients are more likely to be concerned than younger respondents, a natural response, the IDC experts said, considering the heightened risk for coronavirus that older adults face.
That patient concerned is not without good reason, the researchers suggested. During the eight days during which the survey was fielded, the number of COVID-19 cases nearly quadrupled, while the death toll increased about 520 percent.
With the virus asserting itself as deathly, coupled with an industry push for chatbots and virtual visits, patients began to tap different engagement tools to better understand their own health.
“Consumers are receiving more information about telehealth services than ever before, not only from healthcare organizations and their employers, but it’s being touted in the daily press conferences given by their state’s governor and their local public health COVID-19 alerts,” Dunbrack said.
For example, patients are utilizing chatbots that use artificial intelligence as a symptom checker, as well as telehealth, many for the first time ever.
Just over 6 percent of respondents said they used an app with a chatbot symptom checker, with 72.5 percent of those users saying it was their first time using the tool. Just about four in five respondents (83.3 percent) reported satisfaction with the tool. About one in five said chatbots gave information that was easy to understand.
Similarly, 13.5 percent of respondents said they accessed a virtual visit or telehealth, with 83.5 percent of those being first-time visits. Telehealth yielded an 80.5 percent satisfaction rate.
Some populations were more likely to utilize telehealth and chatbots than others, the survey showed.
For example, those who said they were very concerned about the coronavirus were more likely to use telehealth than the general respondent pool. Just over 9 percent of very concerned respondents said they used telehealth, compared to just 7.3 percent of the general population.
Younger patients were also more likely to utilize virtual care visits than older patients. Twenty-seven percent of 18- to 24-year-olds said they downloaded a virtual care app to their phones in case they needed to schedule a remote appointment. This compared to only 19.5 percent of the general respondent population who said the same.
Healthcare is stepping up to the plate by offering ample telehealth services, the report showed. Most patients accessed telehealth through their clinician or provider office (46 percent) or their healthcare payer (29 percent). Only 7.3 percent said they paid for the telehealth visit on their own.
Further, most patients with employer-sponsored healthcare on a major health plan has access to telehealth services. This includes those on, Aetna, Anthem, Cigna, Humana, Kaiser Permanente, and UnitedHealthcare.
Public health messaging has been, and will continue to, play a significant role in addressing patient concerns during the coronavirus pandemic, the data continued. More than half (57.5 percent) of patients said they checked the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) or World Health Organization (WHO) social media challenges to learn more about the virus outbreak.
Another 53.2 percent said they read informational emails from their medical providers and 38.9 percent checked their provider websites for updates.
Going forward, healthcare organizations should act on those patient behavior trends while also expanding their patient outreach channels.
Overwhelmingly, patients said they prefer to receive email outreach and education, while a notable cohort of respondents also said they would be interested in television or video updates, updates on the provider website, and SMS or text message patient outreach to receive coronavirus updates.
It may be too early to call whether these effects will be seen in the future of healthcare consumerism, but according to Dunbrack these responses suggests a robust path forward for patient engagement technology.
“Once [patients] realize how easy it is to use and for certain situations a virtual visit can be as effective as an in person visit, they will want to continue to use the service after the pandemic crisis subsides,” she concluded. “Maybe not across the broad population as there will always be people who will want to receive care in person. But there will be consumers who will appreciate the convenience of using a chat bot to check symptoms or have a virtual care visit for a routine health issue that doesn’t require a hands-on exam.”
Source: PatientEngagement HIT