A Swiss-Irish study of keratoconus patients’ views on virtual consultations during Covid-19 found the majority preferred phonecalls to video chats and were in favour of the service continuing post-lockdown, to avoid outpatient visits.
Researchers from the Royal Victoria Eye and Ear Hospital (RVEEH) in Dublin and the Lucerne Cantonal Hospital in Switzerland surveyed 69 RVEEH patients who had attended a virtual keratoconus clinic by phone or video call, finding nearly 55% strongly agreed they would prefer to continue virtually rather than attend the outpatient clinic. They also found the mean time spent on each remote consultation was 11 minutes, with a mean waiting time for diagnostic tests being four minutes. This compared favourably with patients’ previous average travel time of 89 minutes, costs of €16 (NZ$26), and an examination time of 43 minutes.
Most patients strongly agreed their remote phone or video consultation was conducted in a confidential manner (84% and 80%, respectively) while more than 80% considered the virtual clinic to be equivalent to their previous keratoconus monitoring clinic in terms of outcome. There was also a preference for phone consults compared with video consults, with just 64% of patients consulted via video strongly agreeing they could share personal information with their nurse practitioner, compared with 84% of patients consulted by phone.
