Video Consultation as a Model for the Acceptance of Digital Services in the Healthcare Sector

Hoch, P.; Arets, J.

The increasing need for comprehensive health care currently presents the healthcare system with a major challenge. In particular, digitalization in the care structure should be further intensified in order to withstand the pressure from societal demographic change, globalization of the economy and medical-technical progress. However, digital services in telemedicine require acceptance from both patients and doctors as a primary prerequisite for successful take-off. In the present study, patients who had previously been treated for back pain were asked about the acceptance of the use of a video consultation. With previous experience in the professional or private sector, the acceptance, regardless of the age of the patients, was higher than without previous points of contact with digital services. In the context of the Covid-19 pandemic prevailing during the survey, patients nevertheless showed a higher willingness to use video consultation. This is in spite of the actual previous number of participants in online consultations being extremely low. This could be traced back to the lack of offers by doctors, which could be due to insufficient opportunities caused by a restrictive legal context. However, the positive development of recent years with the enactment of the eHealth Act (2015) and the Digital Care Act (2020) can now help to further develop the digitization process in the German healthcare system.