Virtual Care

Deciding on appropriateness of virtual vs. in-person appointments

• In person visits when phone/video isn’t enough – OCFP
• Questions to consider when booking as in-person, virtual or telephone (based on CPSA recommendations):
  • Is the patient visit urgent/crucial to the patient’s health?
  • Does the patient feel the benefit of therapy exceeds the risk of leaving their home? Would you be putting the patient at risk by asking them to come to the office for something that could be handled over the phone or virtually?
  • Is the medical benefit to the individual patient worth the risk to you and your office staff by having them travel to a community office or health facility?
  • Could further delay in provision of the care or preventative health maintenance result in a worse outcome for the patient?
  • Will offering care in a community setting lessen the burden on hospital facilities?
  • Could scarce resources, like acute care, need to be accessed if the procedure does not go as planned? How will this be coordinated? What impact might that have on limited resources?
  • Will the care provided prevent the need for a patient to access acute care in the foreseeable future?
  • Would a group of peers support the decision of the care being important? Would colleagues perceive these actions as being self-serving, rather than putting the needs of patients, staff and society first? For example, if there was an outbreak related to your clinic or facility, could you justify your decision-making?

Implementation

• Adopting and Integrating Virtual Visits into Care: Draft Clinical Guidance from Health Quality Ontario
• Implementing Virtual Care during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Town Hall hosted by Dr. Sharad Rai, speakers Drs. Daniel Pepe and Gord Schacter, with special guest Dr. Sohail Gandhi, OMA President

Consent

• Discussing consent with the patient – OMA

During the virtual visit

• The OMA COVID-19 guide for virtual care has details on payment for virtual visits, IT platforms that are available, how to get patient consent, and more.
• How to adapt your clinical assessment of patients with COVID-19 for virtual visits – this infographic from British Medical Journal walks you through adapting your usual assessment to a telephone or video visit.
• Virtual Pronouncement of Death – Process Map from OMA,

Billing

• Telephone and video fee code and consent details – OMA

Virtual care tools

• OTN – Using virtual tools to help slow the spread of COVID-19
• Click here to sign up for OTN virtual visits with patients