Primary Care Visits Are Timelier When Patients Choose Telemedicine: A Cross-Sectional Observational Study

Abstract

Introduction:

Telemedicine could increase timely access to primary care—a key dimension of care quality.

Methods:

Among patient-scheduled appointments with their own primary care providers using the online portal in a large integrated health care delivery system, we measured the association between visit type (telemedicine or in-person) and appointment timeliness. We calculated the calendar days between the scheduling date and the actual appointment time.

Results:

Overall, 2,178,440 primary care visits were scheduled and 14% were done through telemedicine. The mean calendar days between the scheduling and the appointment time were 1.80 for telephone visits, 2.29 for video visits, and 3.52 for in-person visits. After multivariate adjustment, 66.61% (confidence interval [95% CI]: 66.44–66.79) of telephone visits, 56.58% (95% CI: 55.90–57.27) of video visits, and 46.49% (95% CI: 46.42–46.57) of in-person visits were scheduled to occur within 1 day of making the appointment.

Conclusions:

In a setting with comparable in-person and telemedicine scheduling availability, choosing telemedicine was associated with more timely access to primary care.