November 2022 Issue Close-Up
Telehealth and Medicine Today (THMT) is the international open access peer reviewed journal bringing you high quality,
breakthrough, and frontline research and reviews that bridge knowledge gaps from research lab to real world market impact in telehealth and frontier technologies healthcare.
Click the 100% OPEN ACCESS article link below to stay up to date. Learn what practicing professionals and researchers have recently reported in the field,
Patient Portal Perceptions in an Urban Community Health Center Setting: Insights for Telehealth
Matthew Sakumoto, Jiancheng Ye, Richard Kalu, Kathryn L Jackson, Sarah Rittner, Timothy Long,
Mita Sanghavi Goel, Theresa L Walunas
DOI: https://doi.org/10.30953/thmt.v7.373
Patient portals are the “front door” to telehealth - online scheduling, video visit links,
and digital after visit summaries are often conveyed via patient portals. Analyzing patients’ perceptions and beliefs around this digital patient engagement tool may lead to insights regarding telehealth, particularly in historically underrepresented patient populations.
Participants from a Federally Qualified Health Center (FQHC) in Chicago, IL were surveyed on general technology use,
healthcare-specific technology use, and barriers and facilitators to patient portal use. The population base was 96% African American, 74% with educational attainment of some college or less, and 48% with at least one chronic medical condition. Technology access and use were high with 78% computer ownership, 98% mobile phone ownership and 75% smartphone ownership.
Insights from barriers, attitudes, and capacity to use patient portal tools deliver important insight into overall adoption of other digital health modalities, including telehealth.
• Learn what insights are gleaned from:
• Patient-level factors influencing attitudes with implications toward
telehealth adoption
• Demographic differences impacting attitudes toward technology adoption
• Equitable uptake of portal and telehealth services requirements for tailored messaging, training, and modes of communication
