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This chapter discusses about the advancement in the field of telemedicine and how often the general public are using the services that are provide by the telehealth and telemedicine market. This chapter starts with the introduction of the medicine in the world, which were the earliest medical practice and how all that thing leads to the today’s telehealth market. This chapter also describes the models that are being used in today’s world, and how these models as implemented and how telemedicine services are implemented more efficiently. Telemedicine and telehealth market is growing day by day and a lot people are getting to know about it, but there is still some section of the society, specially the lower middle class and the people in the rural areas that do not have any access or knowledge about the concept of telehealth services.

Disasters and pandemics pose challenges to health-care provision. Accordingly, the need for adopting innovative approach is required in providing care to patient. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to present telehealth as an innovative approach for providing care to patients and reducing spread of the infection and advocates for the adoption of telehealth for digitalized treatment of patients.

An integrative review methodology of existing evidence was conducted to provide implications for integration of telehealth for digitalized treatment of patients. This paper draws on Technology Organization Environment (TOE) framework to develop a model and propositions to investigate the factors that influence telehealth adoption from the perspective of the supply side and the demand side of medical services.

Findings from this study discuss applications adopted for telehealth and recommendations on how telehealth can be adopted for medical-care delivery. More importantly, the findings and propositions of this study can act as a roadmap to potential research opportunities within and beyond the pandemic. In addition, findings from this study help provide guidelines on how health practitioners can rapidly integrate telehealth into practice for public health emergencies.

This study identifies the social, technological and organizational factors that influence telehealth adoption, and opportunities of adopting telehealth during the public health emergencies. This study concludes that specific policy changes to improve integration of interoperable solutions; data security; better physical infrastructures; broadband access; better transition and workflow balance; availability of funding and remuneration; regulations and reimbursement; awareness; and training will improve telehealth adoption during public health emergencies.

The purpose of this study is to provide current state of knowledge on how the COVID-19 emergency situation necessitated the behaviour influencing use and acceptance of telehealth. This study interlinks the health belief model (HBM) and the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology (UTAUT) to highlight the challenges and opportunities as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic in the public health sector.

This study used three online databases (Emerald publishing, Science Direct and Taylor and Francis) that enabled the authors to access electronic journal articles. Search strategy was used to extract articles based on the relevance of this study.

The key findings from this study suggested that the COVID-19 emergency forced health-care workers and their patients to rapidly use and rely on telehealth to reduce the rate of COVID-19 transmissions. The key benefits of telehealth use highlighted an expansive cost effective and convenient access to health-care services irrespective of geographical local and levels of physical impairment. Moreover, telehealth inhibited in person human interaction, which was perceived as impersonal and not ideal for new patient consultations. The barriers outweighed the benefits; as a result, it is unlikely that there will be a wide use of telehealth beyond the COVID-19 emergency situation.

The research findings are limited to discussions drawn from available secondary data. The criteria within telehealth for policymakers to note the technology acceptance and use for both health-care and outpatient stakeholders and their health seeking behaviour. Health-care sectors (private and public) and government need to understand enablers of effective telehealth in policymaking to ease the barriers during an emergency situation like a pandemic.

This study contributes to the emerging literature on how COVID-19 pandemic has disrupted and accelerated telehealth by extending both the UTAUT and HBM theories. This study is expected to contribute and expand literature on telehealth during emergency situations, given the novice nature of COVID-19 and limited literature surrounding it.

Physical activity is an important component of treatment for people living with mental illness, and exercise practitioners are well placed to deliver these interventions. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic and associated lock-down regulations, exercise professionals have rapidly adapted to the online delivery of services to continue care for their clients. To date, the research surrounding the delivery of exercise sessions via telehealth for this population has been scarce. Therefore, this study aims to explore how exercise professionals working in mental health have adapted to telehealth, the barriers and facilitators they have experienced and the implications for the future.

A qualitative study using semi-structure interviews was conducted. Interviews were audio recorded, transcribed and analysed using reflexive thematic analysis.

Nine exercise physiologists working in mental health settings in Australia participated in the interviews. Two main themes were explored. The first related to the implementation of telehealth and was divided into four sub-themes: service delivery, accessibility and suitability, technology barriers and facilitators, adaptations to exercise prescription. The second theme related to attitudes and was categorised into two sub-themes: attitudes towards telehealth and future recommendations.

Telehealth appears to be a feasible and well accepted platform to deliver exercise sessions for people with mental illness, and this study provides guidance for clinicians including service and training recommendations.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to examine the experiences of exercise physiologists working in mental health and using telehealth.

Taking a business lens of telehealth, this article aims to review and provide a state-of-the-art overview of telehealth research.

This research conducts a systematic literature review using the scientific procedures and rationales for systematic literature reviews (SPAR-4-SLR) protocol and a collection of bibliometric analytical techniques (i.e. performance analysis, keyword co-occurrence, keyword clustering and content analysis).

Using performance analysis, this article unpacks the publication trend and the top contributing journals, authors, institutions and regions of telehealth research. Using keyword co-occurrence and keyword clustering, this article reveals 10 major themes underpinning the intellectual structure of telehealth research: design and development of personal health record systems, health information technology (HIT) for public health management, perceived service quality among mobile health (m-health) users, paradoxes of virtual care versus in-person visits, Internet of things (IoT) in healthcare, guidelines for e-health practices and services, telemonitoring of life-threatening diseases, change management strategy for telehealth adoption, knowledge management of innovations in telehealth and technology management of telemedicine services. The article proposes directions for future research that can enrich our understanding of telehealth services.

This article offers a seminal state-of-the-art overview of the performance and intellectual structure of telehealth research from a business perspective.

The purpose of this paper is to report on a small telehealth pilot in local authority sheltered housing in NE England. This explored the training and capacity building needed to develop a workforce/older person, telehealth partnership and service that is integrated within existing health, social care and housing services.

A qualitative case study approach on the implementation and deployment of a pilot telehealth service, supporting sheltered housing tenants with Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (n=4).

Telehealth training and capacity building, needs to develop from within the workforce/older person partnership, if a usable and acceptable telehealth service is to be developed and integrated within existing health, care and housing services. To be adaptable to changing circumstances and individual need, flexible monitoring is also required.

Service users and workforces, need to work together to provide flexible telehealth monitoring, that in the longer term, may improve service user, quality of life.

The pilot explored a workforce/older person partnership to consider how to add and implement telehealth services, into existing health and housing services.

The COVID-19 pandemic transformed the delivery of occupational therapy (OT) community mental health services nationally, resulting in the rapid expansion and delivery of services through telehealth. While telehealth technology and its use are not new, widespread adoption was precipitated by the cessation of face-to-face services due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Research in this field has been conducted previously; however, it is not specific to OT in the Irish context. This study aims to explore service users’ experience of telehealth OT interventions in adult mental health services during the COVID-19 pandemic.

A descriptive qualitative approach was used to explore service users’ experience of mental health telehealth OT services. Five service users were recruited to participate in a focus group to explore their experience of OT via telehealth. The themes identified from this focus group were then further explored via individual interviews. Four of the service users who participated in the focus group chose to complete in-depth interviews. Reflexive thematic analysis was then completed.

Two key themes emerged from the data. The theme of positive telehealth experiences included subthemes of gratitude for the option of telehealth and accessibility. The second theme of learning from experience, included subthemes of human connection, preferred platforms of telehealth methods and future considerations for telehealth interventions.

These findings provide a unique insight into the importance of continuing OT services via telehealth, from the service users’ perspective.

Despite substantial investment over recent years in telehealth there appears to be little consensus regarding what a successful implementation should achieve. However, defining success is often controversial and complex due to differing views from the large number of stakeholders involved, the local environment where telehealth is deployed and the scope, or size, of any planned initiative. Nevertheless, a number of generic measures are proposed in this paper which then provides a framework for the measurement of success. The local context can then be applied to determine the exact emphasis on specific measures, but it is proposed that all of the measures should be included in the holistic measurement of success. Having considered what constitutes success, attention is then given to how success should be quantified. Robust evaluation is fundamental and there is much debate as to whether the ‘gold standard’ randomised control trial (RCT) is the most appropriate methodology for telehealth. If the intervention, technology and system, can be maintained in a stable state then the RCT may well provide the most authoritative evidence for decision‐makers. However, ensuring such stability, in what is still a novel combination of technology and service, is difficult and consequently other approaches may be more appropriate when stability is unlikely to be maintained.

Telehealth consultations are likely to continue while living with COVID-19 and the risk of other pandemics. Greater understanding of patient perceptions is important in order to inform future integrated care models involving telehealth.

An interpretative qualitative study. Fifteen, in-depth qualitative interviews were conducted with diverse range of community dwelling patients who attended outpatient clinics at The John Hunter Hospital, Newcastle. Data were analysed using an inductive thematic approach.

Key themes were identified: (1) telehealth is valuable in a pandemic; (2) telehealth accessibility can be challenging; (3) there are variations in care experiences, especially when visual feedback is lacking; (4) telehealth for acute and complex care needs may lead to gaps and (5) considerations towards the future of telehealth, beyond a pandemic.

There is a shortfall in evidence of the patient experience of integrated care within a telehealth framework. The results provided practical insights into how telehealth services can play a greater role in integrated care.

Apart from the need for affordable access to high-speed data for basic Internet access, the author posit the need for patient and clinician training towards promoting communication that is underpinned by choice, trust and shared decision-making.

Telehealth is important towards keeping patients safe during COVID-19. Key findings extend knowledge of the practical implications need to promote integrated telehealth systems. While there is a benefit in extending telehealth to more preventative activities, there is also a need for greater service coordination and sharing of information between treating clinicians. Overall the results highlight telehealth consultations to be an effective means of treating well-known conditions and for follow-up rather than for acute conditions.

This study aims to determine elements of telehealth that have the potential to increase costs for the health system in the short to medium term.

A search of PubMed, EMBASE and Scopus databases was performed in May 2018 using broad terms for telehealth and economics. Articles were included if they identified and explained reasons for an increase in cost for telehealth services. Studies were categorised by economic analysis type for data extraction and descriptive synthesis.

Fourteen studies met inclusion criteria and were included in the review. These studies identified that increased health system costs were due to implementation costs (e.g. for equipment, software or staff training), increased use of other healthcare services (e.g. pharmaceutical services) and ongoing service costs (including staff salaries) resulting from telehealth being additive to traditional service (e.g. increased frequency of contact).

Telehealth is often assumed to be a cost-effective method of delivering healthcare, even to the point where direct cost savings are expected by decision makers as a result of implementation. However, this investigation suggests it does not routinely reduce costs for the health system and can actually increase costs at both implementation and ongoing service delivery stages. Health services considering implementing telehealth should be motivated by benefits other than cost reduction such as improved accessibility, greater patient centricity and societal cost–benefit.