Telemedicine: a balanced perspective

Bajwa and colleagues in this month’s journal describe perceptions of telemedicine use from both parent and pediatrician perspectives during the COVID-19 epidemic (September 2021–January 2022) in Geneva, Switzerland.¹ Medicine, especially in a fee for service system, has often been a technology in search of a disease rather than a patient in need of technology. The need to use expensive technology results in increased costs, overdiagnosis, and lack of availability of the technology for appropriate use.^2,3 These authors offer a refreshing outlook on the medical technology of telemedicine, giving a balanced view (advantages and disadvantages) as well as a more granular discussion of the clinical scenarios where telemedicine is most appropriate.

Although telemedicine has been in use for decades, its use grew exponentially out of necessity during the recent pandemic.^4,5 Caregivers and patients had to adapt quickly to decrease transmission of a highly virulent pathogen while continuing to provide and receive care.⁵ The epidemic provided a natural experiment for these authors to study effectiveness of this modality in a more universal setting. As the world returns to normal, telemedicine will remain as a viable option for health care; there is a critical need to understands how this modality fits into the healthcare system when in person visits are not as restricted. These data will help fill that gap.