Remote consultations in England during COVID-19: challenges in data quality, linkage, and research validity
OA Location
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the adoption of remote consultations across health care, requiring rapid adjustments in service delivery. Consequently, there is an urgent need to understand the impact of remote consultations on health pathways. This viewpoint paper explores key challenges in data sources in England that hinder research on the impact of remote consultations on health outcomes. Based on our experience conducting research on this topic, we present variations in observational study findings and their validity, considering differences in population characteristics and data sources. We provide recommendations to enhance data quality for future research, including improvements in data recording platforms and strengthened structures for linking primary and secondary care electronic health records.
Date Issued
2025-08-20
Date Acceptance
2025-06-22
Citation
Online Journal of Public Health Informatics, 2025, 17
ISSN
1947-2579
Publisher
JMIR Publications
Start Page
e66672
End Page
e66672
Journal / Book Title
Online Journal of Public Health Informatics
Volume
17
Copyright Statement
© Liliana Hidalgo-Padilla, Massar Dabbous, Kristoffer Halvorsrud, Thomas Beaney, Gideon Gideon, Eoin Gogarty, Geva Greenfield, Benedict Hayhoe, Gabriele Kerr, Rosalind Raine, Nirandeep Rehill, Robert Stewart, Fiona Gaughran, Mariana Pinto da Costa. Originally published in the Online Journal of Public Health Informatics (https://ojphi.jmir.org/), 20.08.2025. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecom- mons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work, first published in the Online Journal of Public Health Informatics, is properly cited. The complete bibliographic information, a link to the original publication on https://ojphi.jmir.org/, as well as this copyright and license information must be included.
License URL
Identifier
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/40835383
PII: v17i1e66672
Subjects
COVID-19
EHR
England
data quality
data sources
electronic health record
remote consultation
remote consultations
remote monitoring
secondary care
telecare
telehealth
telemedicine
Publication Status
Published
Coverage Spatial
Canada
Article Number
e66672