Implementation of web-based hospital specialist consultations to improve quality and expediency of general practitioners' care: a feasibility study.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Rising healthcare costs due to unnecessary referrals to secondary healthcare services underscore the need for optimizing current referral procedures. This study investigates whether the use of web-based consultation (WBC) in general practice is a feasible alternative to decrease referrals.

Methods

Patients with lumbosacral radicular syndrome, knee complaints, or thyroid dysfunction, who visited the general practitioner (GP) between May 2015 and December 2016 were included for a WBC. We determined whether the GP would refer a patient to an outpatient clinic in the absence of a WBC and then compared this decision with the referral advice from a specialist. We further assessed the user-friendliness of the WBC service based on average recorded user time and feedback f

SUBMITTER: van der Velden T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6540440 | biostudies-literature | 2019 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature