Patient and physician satisfaction in a clinical study of telemedicine in a hypertensive patient population

We studied patient and physician satisfaction with telemedicine for the car e of a hypertensive population. Once recruited, participants were seen both in person and via telemedicine (in random order) on the same day. After ea ch meeting, patient and physician satisfaction surveys were completed. In t he 12-month study, there were 107 pairs of visits. The physicians reported a small but significant increase in workload, mental effort, technical skil ls and visit duration for telemedicine when compared with face-to-face cons ultations. They noted that the telemedicine system worked well In the major ity of cases and could reduce the need for future treatment. Patients repor ted slightly but significantly higher satisfaction scores for the following for in-person than for telemedicine meetings: technical quality, interpers onal care and time spent. Patients reported high satisfaction scores for bo th telemedicine and in-person visits.