Findings
A total of 55 state-registered podiatrists completed the questionnaire
and fifteen participated in the focus groups. The results from the
podiatrist’s questionnaire indicated that the security relating to
telemedicine technology was of utmost importance (x̅ = 4.18, SD = 0.70),
whilst clinicians’ knowledge on telemedicine technology was the scored
lowest (x̅ = 2.11, SD = 0.63). Furthermore, podiatrists gave a score of
below 3 when they were asked whether they would consider using podiatric
telemedicine in future consultations indicating that there still existed
a degree of uncertainty among podiatrists whether they are willing to
adopt telemedicine consultations. In addition, podiatrists have
suggested that if they were to consider telemedicine consultation, their
first preference would be for pre-operative podiatric care, followed by
dermatological and post-operative care, with musculoskeletal and
infection cases being ranked as third preference.
With regards to the service users questionnaire, a total of 171 valid
responses were obtained with 68% of the respondents being females and
33% of which were over the age of 50. The utilization of information
technology devices was common amongst the service users, except for the
use of eBooks, which did not yield any statistically significant
findings. The internal consistency of the eight IT familiarity
statements was deemed excellent, as evidenced by a Cronbach’s alpha
coefficient of 0.886.
With reference to the service user questionnaire utilizing TUQ, mean
scores exhibit an upward trend, indicating that there was a higher
likelihood of agreement among the respondents regarding the use of
podiatric telemedicine as part of their healthcare. The participants
agreed that telemedicine is a time-efficient alternative to physically
visiting a healthcare facility (x̅ = 6.10, SD = 0.18). However, there was
a lack of consensus regarding the comparability of telemedicine
consultations to in-person visits (x̅ = 3.70, SD = 0.27). The word cloud,
as presented in Figure 2A, illustrates the prevalent themes that
surfaced from the open-ended questioning posed to the service users,
inquiring about their perspectives on podiatric telemedicine. The
outcomes from the focus groups conducted among podiatrists and
interviews conducted with senior management are illustrated in Figure
2B.