Shared Care and Virtual Clinics for Glaucoma in a Hospital Setting

• Type: Article in International Scientific Journal
• Date: 2021

Authors

Simons, AS (Author) Other; Vercauteren, J (Author) Other; Barbosa Breda, J (Author) FMUP; Stalmans, I (Author) Other

Journal

Title: Journal of Clinical Medicine

Final page: 4785

ISSN: 2077-0383

Publisher: MDPI

Indexing

ISI Web of Knowledge - 4 Citations

Scopus - 5 Citations

Other information

Authenticus ID: P-00V-JST

DOI: 10.3390/jcm10204785

Abstract (EN): Glaucoma patients require lifelong management, and the prevalence of glaucoma is expected to increase, resulting in capacity problems in many hospital eye departments. New models of care delivery are needed to offer requisite capacity. This review evaluates two alternative schemes for glaucoma care within a hospital, i.e., shared care (SC) and virtual clinics (VCs), whereby non-medical staff are entrusted with more responsibilities, and compares these schemes with the "traditional " ophthalmologist-led outpatient service (standard care). A literature search was conducted in three large bibliographic databases (PubMed, Embase, and Trip), and the abstracts from the prior five annual meetings of the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology were consulted. Twenty-nine were included in the review (14 on SC and 15 on VCs). Patients with low risk of vision loss were considered suitable for these approaches. Among the non-medical staff, optometrists were the most frequently involved. The quality of both schemes was good and improved with the non-medical staff being trained in glaucoma care. No evidence was found on patients feeling disadvantaged by the lack of a doctor visit. Both schemes increased the hospital's efficiency. Both SC and VCs are promising approaches to tackle the upcoming capacity problems of hospital-based glaucoma care.</p>

Language: English

Type (Professor's evaluation): Scientific

No. of pages: 24