Virtual medical consultations could become a key component in the sustainability strategy of the world of healthcare, according to new research from the United Kingdom. According to the findings published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research, this approach to appointments could reduce the industry’s carbon footprint.
As a result of the pandemic, remote consultations have become a popular approach that protects the health of both patient and practitioner. Virtual care could have a variety of knock-on effects, including in terms of the environmental sustainability of healthcare.
Oxford University researchers have undertaken a study to investigate the impact in that area. They reviewed 1,672 published studies and selected 23 that represented a variety of virtual consulting equipment and platforms of different clinical conditions and services.
With telemedicine appointments, including video and telephone visits, patient travel time is significantly reduced. As such, virtual consultation could be an effective way for the authorities to achieve environmental sustainability goals, they say.
The studies selected used different methods and approaches to estimate carbon savings, but despite their methodological variations, the conclusion was that virtual consultations significantly reduced carbon emissions.
However, most of this research did not address factors related to patients’ qualitative experience, and the setups that would affect the extent of which virtual appointments were accepted and successful.
“Health systems urgently need to become more environmentally sustainable. Our review shows that virtual consultations offer one means to help with that,” said lead author Sarah Shaw.
“While adoption and spread of virtual consulting needs to be considered alongside systemic, organisational, clinical, and patient-related factors, when done well and at scale, they offer significant potential for carbon savings, primarily but not only through reductions in travel.
“The pandemic brought a big shift to virtual care. This is set to continue, and our findings suggest it will help to mitigate the effects of climate change.”
Of course, other environmental impacts such as e-waste generated by telemedicine need to be assessed in the future.
And according to the researchers, there is a need for virtual consulting services to analyse the potential for emissions reductions, and weigh them against the possible benefits and risks – for example, missed diagnoses – of boosting such services.