Patient satisfaction scores with telemedicine in the neurosurgical population.

Background: The benefits of telemedicine in neurosurgery have been widely studied, especially as its implementation into clinical practice boomed at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. However, few studies have investigated telemedicine from the perspective of the patient experience.

Objective: To evaluate patient satisfaction scores of telemedicine outpatient clinic visits in neurosurgery in comparison with in-person visits.

Methods: After obtaining Institutional Review Board approval, Press Ganey surveys from 3/1/2019 to 9/15/2020 were evaluated retrospectively from single-institution, academic neurosurgical clinics. Due to the non-normality of our data, stratified Wilcoxon tests were performed with correction for care provider differences. Domain score probability values were corrected for multiple comparisons. Average scores (range 20-100) are documented as mean ± standard deviation.

Results: The response rates were 20% (97 responders) for telemedicine visits and 19% (589 responders) for in-person visits. Patient overall satisfaction score was slightly higher with telemedicine visits compared to in-person corrected for care provider differences (94.2 ± 12.2 vs 93.1 ± 13.4, p = 0.085). The care provider domain demonstrated no statistically significant difference in telemedicine compared to in-person (94.7 ± 14.4 vs 92.4 ± 16.5, p = 0.096). The access domain (93.7 ± 12.3 vs 93.4 ± 12.4, p = 0.999) and overall domains (94.1 ± 12.1 vs 94.4 ± 13.4, p = 1.000) were not found to be different between visit types.

Conclusion: Telemedicine appears to be a valuable option for neurosurgical patients and is not significantly different to in-person visits in all domains. This study demonstrates that telemedicine visits result in comparable satisfaction scores by neurosurgical patients, and providers should continue offering this option to their patients as we approach the post-COVID era.