An Assessment of Jamaicans use of Telemedicine during Coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19) Pandemic

Abstract

Coronavirus disease 19 (COVID-19) had led to serious clinical manifestations. COVID-19 infected around 173,331,478 people in the current situation, and it is responsible for 3,735,571 deaths worldwide, as reported by the World Health Organization on June 8, 2021. Telemedicine has the potential to become a key technology for providing medical care to patients in Jamaica and around the world to maintain social distances, thus reducing the transmission of the virus among patients, families, and doctors. Therefore, the main objectives of this paper are to present a systematic review: (1) on the assessment of telemedicine during the COVID-19 pandemic, (2) on the focus on the degree of telemedicine among Jamaicans during the COVID-19 pandemic and, (3) to determine if there is a preference between telemedicine and direct patient care. This research conducted was a quantitative survey to collect data from Jamaicans utilizing a co-relational research technique. The researchers implemented a non-probability sampling to procure the data from 518 sampling respondents across the fourteen parishes in Jamaica. Nevertheless, the researchers combined the Kingston and St. Andrew parishes to make it thirteen parishes. Google Forms served as a means to collect the data using a systemized survey. The data were converted from Google Forms to Statistical Packages for the Social Sciences (SPSS) for Windows version 27.0 with a 95% confidence interval. 70.5% (n=365) of the sampled respondents indicated that they have never used telemedicine. Additionally, 80.9% (n= 419) prefers face to face patient care, 41.7% (n=216) respondents and 65.8% (n=341) agrees that it is relevant during the COVID-19 pandemic. The government should introduce measures that address the decline in the usage of telemedicine.