Doctors rate telehealth as the most promising technology during COVID-19, survey finds

Research published this week by Philips gives an insight into doctors’ experience of COVID-19 and how they believe the healthcare industry should change in response.

The Future Health Index (FHI) Insights: COVID-19 and Younger Healthcare Professionals survey supplements the main FHI 2020 global report, The Age of Opportunity.

It captures feedback from 500 doctors under the age of 40 in five countries: France, Germany, the US, China and Singapore.

The survey reveals that during COVID-19, younger doctors changed their attitudes towards the relative benefits of different health technologies.

Before the pandemic, 60% ranked artificial intelligence (AI) as the top digital health technology that would most improve their work satisfaction, with 39% identifying telehealth as the top technology. Now following the pandemic, 61% rank telehealth as the digital health technology that would have most improved their experiences at this time, with AI falling to 53%.

For many younger doctors, working through COVID-19 has shown what a more technologically forward-thinking workplace could look like, with 44% reporting the pandemic exposed them to new ways of using digital health technologies.