Sudden Shift to Telehealth in COVID-19: A Retrospective Cohort Study of Disparities in Use of Telehealth for Prenatal Care in a Large Midwifery Service.
Denise Colter SmithE Brie ThummJessica AndersonKatherine J KisslerSean M ReedSophia M CentiAlyse W StaleyTeri L HernandezAmy J BartonPublished in: Journal of midwifery & women's health (2023)
No differences in the frequency of in-person prenatal care visits suggests that telehealth encounters led to more contact with midwives and did not replace in-person encounters. Spanish-speaking patients were least likely to use telehealth-delivered prenatal care during the pandemic; a small, but significant, proportion of patients had no or few telehealth encounters, and a significant proportion had high use of telehealth. Integration of telehealth in future delivery of prenatal care should consider questions of equity, patient and provider satisfaction, access, redundancies, and provider workload.