Family doctors consider that the Covid-19 pandemic has increased difficulties in accessing health care, especially in some groups, such as the elderly. These are results already known from an international study coordinated by a researcher from CINTESIS/Faculty of Medicine of the University of Porto (FMUP).
Ana Luísa Neves, cited by Agência LUSA, points out that digital technologies also have had a “positive effect” in the overall reduction of the risk of transmission of Covid-19 in the monitoring of infected patients, in the provision of preventive care and in the monitoring of chronic diseases.
The preliminary results of the current study indicate the perspectives of family doctors from several countries on the use of digital technologies in primary health care imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic. The research team will now know the perceptions of the users of this care.
“It is an ethical imperative to draw from this experience the necessary lessons to understand how, under what circumstances, and with which groups of patients these models may continue to be used in the future”, highlights the researcher.
Read more (in Portuguese).