Introduction: We reviewed the safety and effectiveness of our hospital's urologic telemedicine (TM) program that has been utilized for the Iowa prisoner population for over a decade.
Methods: A retrospective review of TM visits of male prisoners from 2007 to 2014 was performed. Effectiveness of TM visits was assessed by 1) concordance of TM and in-person diagnoses, 2) compliance with radiologic and medication orders and 3) in-person visits saved with TM. Safety was assessed by analyzing the number of patients in which an ED visit was required after TM visit and missed or delayed cases of malignancy. Estimates were then made of the number of patients that could safely be managed with TM alone.
Results: The most common diagnosis was voiding dysfunction (24%) followed by genitourinary pain (23%). Diagnoses were concordant in 90% of patients; compliance was high (radiology 91%, medications 89%); in-person visits were estimated to be saved in 80-94%. No men required peri-TM ED visits and no cases of malignancy were missed in the population that returned for an in-person visit. We estimated that over 50% of urologic complaints in this cohort could have been managed with TM alone.
Conclusions: TM was shown to be a safe and effective method to provide general urologic care that obviated the initial in-person visits in nearly 90% of patients. It is likely that TM could safely replace in-person visits for many urologic conditions, especially in younger men and those in which access to specialized care may be limited.
Keywords: cost-benefit analysis; prisoners; telemedicine.