Teleconsultation is one of the alternatives for doctors, nurses, and psychologists to attend remotely

With the quarantine, many professions had to reinvent themselves. This was the case with working in offices, shops and schools, which had to Rethink how they would act remotely. Tools for this, such as online meeting apps and web management platforms, already existed, they just weren't put into practice. So why should it be any different with medicine?

With a highly contagious virus on the loose, the mere fact of going to a doctor's appointment already represents a possibility of risk, for doctors and for patients. People's health, however, cannot wait. It would be necessary to find a solution so that the population and the medical profession could meet without this posing a danger to any of the parties. Teleconsultation is one of the possibilities for the medical service not to stop and, at the same time, to remain safe.

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What is teleconsultation

As its name suggests, this is a type of medical consultation in which the patient and the health professional meet at a distance. Consultations can be made through secure online communication technologies, video conferencing, or video calling apps on cell phones, tablets, or desktops.

During the Covid-19 pandemic, the Federal Council of Medicine (CFM) freed doctors to provide this type of care. What was seen was that teleconsultation keeps patients safe at home and helps a lot so as not to burden the health system. If that were not enough, we can also say that remote consultation expands the offer of various medical specialties to communities that lack these professionals.

What are the teleconsultation models

As Teleconsultations can be done between doctors, especially when the general practitioner asks a specialist for help, seeking a more complete diagnosis, a medication that helps the patient's health, or guidance on how to perform a procedure. When it does this, the patient may or may not be present.

Another type of teleconsultation, perhaps the one that attracts the most attention in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, is the one that is carried out directly between doctor and patient. This can be synchronous, when there is immediate interaction for a period of time, such as video call queries, or asynchronous where the interaction is indirect, taking place at different times.

As queries they may be initial, follow-up, emergency, or supervisory. The specialties can be the most diverse, such as: dermatology, psychiatry, cardiology, and many others.

Advantages of teleconsultation

One of the main advantages of teleconsultation is the extension of the medical service to patients in geographical regions that are difficult to access or with difficult mobility. The accuracy of the diagnoses must also be taken into account, since there are hospitals and clinical centers that do not have specialists and through teleconsultation these professionals can be directly accessed without many obstacles.

However, there are more points in favor of this type of consultation, such as the optimization of time and costs, both for doctors and patients.

So, if we were to list the benefits of teleconsultation, this list could look like this:

• Decrease in distances
• Agility in treatment
• Reduction of operating costs in clinics
• Information security

Consent form for virtual consultation

In addition to medicine, there are other health specialties that allow remote consultation. They are: nursing, speech therapy, and psychology.

On our blog, we provide a document that serves as a model for a virtual consultation consent form for nursing professionals. In this model, we also provide the Clicksign Automation free of charge, to generate your personalized document and carry out the electronic signature, with legal validity.