In my Facebook Focus Group experiment, one of the leading concerns was decreasing wait times in the office. Many people expressed dissatisfaction with taking an hour off from work, waiting an hour in the waiting room, and 30 minutes in the exam room (missing more work than planned), and then spending only 7 minutes in front of the physician for a simple problem. And who can blame them?

Another (single) response suggested e-visits. What’s an e-visit, you say? An e-visit is an encounter with a doctor or a nurse that doesn’t involve a trip to the office. It might be by phone or by teleconference. Sometimes it involves a pre-visit questionnaire. You don’t hear a lot about e-visits because, like so many things we do, it all depends on what the insurance companies think about it. If the health insurance companies in an an area pay for e-visits (and they do in some places, typically at discounted rates), then patients usually are excited to take advantage of them. Typically for simple problems or follow up for ongoing management of stable, uncomplicated chronic disease states.

Assuming reimbursement is not an issue, are they okay? Can a doctor do as good a job without seeing a patient face-to-face? A new study was just published that looked at simple problems like UTI’s and sinus infections found e-visits to be more cost effective and similarly effective. The one difference they found was that those receiving care in an e-visit were more likely to receive antibiotics then those seen in person. But there was no ultimate difference in outcomes.

My opinion is that, when your doctor knows you well, a lot of what typically happens in the office could safely happen over the phone (or via teleconference), and certainly be more convenient for the patient, compared to taking time off work and suffering long waits in the office. I’m interested to know how you feel…