Virtual clinics for glaucoma care – patients’ and clinicians’ experiences and perceptions: a qualitative evaluation
Gunn J, Marks J, Au L, et al
Eye (2022) 36:209-218
Review: Virtual glaucoma clinics are being used throughout the world in an attempt to help address the increasing glaucoma burden facing clinicians within public hospital systems. This study specifically evaluated patient and clinician satisfaction from two virtual clinic setups in the UK.
Virtual clinics are where in-person doctor-patient interactions are replaced by two components. The first is a patient visit for clinical measurements including visual acuity, intraocular pressure, visual field, OCT and disc photography. Patient data collection is usually performed by a technician, nurse or optometrist. The second component is the reviewing of results by an ophthalmologist, nurse specialist or glaucoma-trained optometrist, and an outcome sent to the patient by letter. Specific criteria are usually set in place to determine patient suitability.
The authors found nearly 95% of patients had confidence and satisfaction in the person conducting the tests and most (>90%) were likely to recommend the service to family and friends. However, they also noted that 10% of patients were not happy to receive clinic results by post and 12% would have been happy to wait longer to see a doctor. There were also high levels of satisfaction reported among staff involved in the virtual clinic testing, as well as the clinicians involved in the reporting of results.
The authors concluded virtual glaucoma clinics can be acceptable to the majority of patients, staff and clinicians. Dissatisfaction was primarily related to poor communication rather than the service itself.
