Travel Avoidance Using Telepediatric by Patients and Healthcare Providers: a Review of the Literature

INTRODUCTION: Telepediatric is one of the subspecialties of telemedicine that can be defined as the use of information and communication technology tools to offer healthcare services to children at a distance. AIM: The use of telepediatric healthcare services for children living in rural or deserved areas may reduce the cost and time of travel to access these services. This study aims to review published papers that assess the percentage of avoided travel or referrals with the use of telepediatric. METHODS: This is a systematic review study. PubMed database was searched in September 2019 to retrieve the published papers. The final 24 retrieved papers were assessed based on the variables such as modality, referral setting, specialty, continent, weight, and percentage of avoided travel. The multivariate linear regression model was used to estimate the percentage of travel avoidance by telepediatric. RESULTS: The linear regression model was determined based on the provided specialty for telepediatric (cardiology, general (multi), and other (rehabilitation, dermatology, psychiatry, respiratory)) with R2 =0.41. The results showed that the mean percentage of avoided travel in cardiology specialty as a baseline was 56%. The use of telepediatric in the general (multi) and other specialties can avoid travel for 26.5% (p=0.02) and 85% (p=0.03) respectively. CONCLUSION: This study showed that telepediatric could reduce travel at least 26.5% and maximal 85%. These results can be used by healthcare providers to decide on the implementation of successful telepediatric systems to reduce referrals.