Background:

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has profoundly increased utilization of tele-medicine worldwide, particularly virtual visit, also known as tele consultation to replace majority of traditional in-person visit to continue deliver care whilst reduce risk of transmission to both healthcare provider and patients. In Malaysia, tele consultation allowed continuous outpatient care and timely follow-up visit when movement control was employed against COVID 19 outbreak. As tele consultation was not popular in Malaysia before pandemic, this study aimed to determine demographic characteristic and feedback of patients attended teleconsultation through video conferencing using a tele-medicine satisfaction survey.

Subjects and methods:

Online tele-medicine survey was sent to patients attended teleconsultation between March, 2020 to November, 2020 via WhatsApp. Tele-health usability questionnaire (TUQ) was used to assess patient satisfaction in term of 1) usefulness, 2) ease of use and learn ability, 3) interface quality, 4) interaction quality, 5) reliability, and 6) satisfaction and future use of teleconsultation. Patients gave their feedback based on 7-point Likert scale.

Results:

In total, 150 responses were gathered. Average score of each aspects and total average score were higher than 5. Usefulness had the highest score whereas reliability had the lowest. According to the responses, teleconsultation system used in present study was easy to learn and use, patients agreed teleconsultation is an acceptable way of healthcare delivery, they were able to have satisfactory interaction and communication with healthcare provider and they liked using it.

Conclusion:

Overall, patients showed positive response to virtual clinic visit and its utility as alternative healthcare delivery.

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