Both US And International Doctors Unimpressed With Govt Telehealth Adoption

A new survey by physician social network SERMO has concluded that both US and foreign physicians aren’t impressed with national and local telehealth efforts by governments.

The US portion of the survey, which had 1,651 physician respondents, found that few US doctors were pleased with the telehealth adoption efforts in their state. Forty-one percent said they felt their state had done a “fair” job in adopting telehealth, which 44 percent said the state’s programs were either “poor” or “very poor.” Just 15 percent of US physicians rated their state’s telehealth leaders as doing either “well” or “very well” with such efforts.

Among the various states, Ohio’s programs got the best ratings, with 22 percent of doctors saying the state’s telehealth programs were doing “well” or “very well.” California came in in second place, with 20 percent of physician-respondents describing their state’s efforts as doing “well” or “very well.”

On the flip side, 59 percent of New Jersey doctors said the state’s telehealth efforts were “poor” or “very poor.” New York also got low ratings, with 51 percent of doctors deeming the state’s programs were “poor” or “very poor.”

Interestingly, physicians based outside the US had comparable – though slightly more positive — impressions of their countries’ telehealth efforts. Thirty-eight percent of the 1,831 non-US doctors responding to the survey rated their country as having done a “fair” job with telehealth adoption, a stronger middle ground than in the US. That being said, 43 percent said their country has done a “poor” or “very poor” job with adopting telehealth programs, while just 19 percent rated their countries’ efforts as going “well” or “very well.”

As with state-by-state impressions in the US, physicians’ impressions of how well their country was doing with telehealth adoption varied significantly.  Spain got the best rating, with 26 percent of physicians saying efforts there were going “well” or “very well.” Meanwhile, the United Kingdom got the worst ratings, with 62 percent of doctors describing telehealth efforts there as “poor” or “very poor.”

Of course, all of this begs the question of what doctors were taking into account when they rated their country or state’s telehealth-related initiatives.

What makes doctors feel one telehealth adoption program is effective and another not effective? What kind of support are physicians looking for from their state or country? Are there barriers to implementation that a government entity is better equipped to address than private industry? Do they want officials to support the advancement of telehealth technology?  I’d prefer to know the answers to these questions before leaping to any conclusions about the significance of SERMO’s data.

That being said, it does seem that doctors see some role for government in promoting the growth of telehealth use, if for no other reason than that that they’re paying enough attention to know whether such efforts are working or not. That surprises me a bit, given that the biggest obstacles to physician telehealth adoption are generally getting paid for such services and handling the technology aspects of telemedicine delivery.

But if the study is any indication, doctors want more support from public entities. I’ll be interested to see whether Ohio and California keep leading the pack in this country — and what they’re doing right.

About the author

Anne Zieger

Anne Zieger is a healthcare journalist who has written about the industry for 30 years. Her work has appeared in all of the leading healthcare industry publications, and she's served as editor in chief of several healthcare B2B sites.

   

Categories