gms | German Medical Science

Clinical issue/s: The demand for hand therapy services is on the increase: in order to meet it, new and innovative ways of working to deliver high quality care are urgently required. But innovations in healthcare must be shown to benefit the patient. Patients' views on the value of receiving virtual hand therapy consultations have not yet been examined.

Clinical reasoning: Video-based or virtual consultations have been demonstrated to be a safe and efficient use of resources in several areas of therapy and medicine including speech therapy, general practice clinics and physiotherapy clinics. However there are few hand therapy services delivering consultations via this medium. The patient perspective and experience unique to hand therapy and the requirements of this population need to be investigated.

Innovative, analytical or new approach: Virtual consultation clinics were established to offer review appointments for those who actively selected the service and or were unable to attend face to face appointments. The patient's perspective and the barriers and enablers to delivering hand therapy treatment in this way in place of traditional face to face treatment will be presented.

The main enablers to successful virtual consultation were found to be preparation, connectivity, support with on line exercise content and ability to send equipment in the post. The highlighted barriers include dedicated space and clinic set up, ability to review documentation in real time and poor internet connection with lack of camera access.

Contribution to advancing HT practice: The model of delivering hand therapy appointments via virtual consultations has been shown to provide benefits for the patient, therapist and health service in patients who self-select to receive treatment via this digital means. A lessons learned approach provides valuable information on how to ensure effective use of this technology.