Abstract
Background:
It is widely accepted that the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the era of virtual healthcare delivery, including in community palliative care. This study was part of a larger project involving a collaboration between universities, healthcare services, government agencies, and software developers, that sought to enhance an existing telehealth (video call) platform with additional features to improve both patient and HCP experience in a palliative care context.
Objective:
The aim of this study was to understand palliative care patients’ and healthcare professionals’ (HCPs) experiences of telehealth delivery in a palliative care context in Victoria (Australia). For the purposes of this study, telehealth included consultations via both video and telephone calls. By better understanding users’ experiences and perceptions of telehealth, we hoped to determine users’ preferences for new telehealth enhancement features.
Methods:
Participants were recruited from a major tertiary hospital network’s palliative care unit in Victoria (Australia). Participants were asked to generate 3-5 photographs depicting their telehealth experiences. These photographs were used as visual aids to prompt discussion during subsequent one-on-one interviews. Intertextual analysis was conducted to identify key themes.
Results:
Three overarching themes emerged: Comfort (or lack thereof) afforded by telehealth; Connection considerations in telehealth; and Care quality impacts of telehealth. Patients (n=6) described telehealth as supporting their physical and psychological comfort and maintaining connection with HCPs, yet there were specific situations where it failed to meet their needs or impacted care quality and delayed treatment. HCPs (n=6) recognised the benefit of telehealth for patients but reported several limitations of telehealth, in particular due to lack of physical examination opportunities. Participants indicated that two types of connection were imperative for effective telehealth delivery: technical connection (e.g. good internet connectivity or clear phone line), and interpersonal connection (i.e. good rapport and therapeutic alliance between the HCPs and patients. Often technical connection issues impeded the development of interpersonal connection between the HCPs and patients in telehealth.
Conclusions:
The findings presented in this article combined with other co-design activities which are outside the scope of this paper, indicated the potential value of a telehealth enhancement feature that generates patient-facing clinical consultation summaries. Our team has developed a video telehealth enhancement feature which will enable clinicians to distil key actionable advice and self-management guidance discussed during teleconsultations for a take-home summary document for patients. The feature prototype has been subjected to an initial simulation study which will be reported in a future publication.
It is widely accepted that the COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated the era of virtual healthcare delivery, including in community palliative care. This study was part of a larger project involving a collaboration between universities, healthcare services, government agencies, and software developers, that sought to enhance an existing telehealth (video call) platform with additional features to improve both patient and HCP experience in a palliative care context.
Objective:
The aim of this study was to understand palliative care patients’ and healthcare professionals’ (HCPs) experiences of telehealth delivery in a palliative care context in Victoria (Australia). For the purposes of this study, telehealth included consultations via both video and telephone calls. By better understanding users’ experiences and perceptions of telehealth, we hoped to determine users’ preferences for new telehealth enhancement features.
Methods:
Participants were recruited from a major tertiary hospital network’s palliative care unit in Victoria (Australia). Participants were asked to generate 3-5 photographs depicting their telehealth experiences. These photographs were used as visual aids to prompt discussion during subsequent one-on-one interviews. Intertextual analysis was conducted to identify key themes.
Results:
Three overarching themes emerged: Comfort (or lack thereof) afforded by telehealth; Connection considerations in telehealth; and Care quality impacts of telehealth. Patients (n=6) described telehealth as supporting their physical and psychological comfort and maintaining connection with HCPs, yet there were specific situations where it failed to meet their needs or impacted care quality and delayed treatment. HCPs (n=6) recognised the benefit of telehealth for patients but reported several limitations of telehealth, in particular due to lack of physical examination opportunities. Participants indicated that two types of connection were imperative for effective telehealth delivery: technical connection (e.g. good internet connectivity or clear phone line), and interpersonal connection (i.e. good rapport and therapeutic alliance between the HCPs and patients. Often technical connection issues impeded the development of interpersonal connection between the HCPs and patients in telehealth.
Conclusions:
The findings presented in this article combined with other co-design activities which are outside the scope of this paper, indicated the potential value of a telehealth enhancement feature that generates patient-facing clinical consultation summaries. Our team has developed a video telehealth enhancement feature which will enable clinicians to distil key actionable advice and self-management guidance discussed during teleconsultations for a take-home summary document for patients. The feature prototype has been subjected to an initial simulation study which will be reported in a future publication.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Number of pages | 23 |
| Journal | JMIR Human Factors |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Accepted/In press - 2024 |
