ArticleAnnals of the Royal College of Surgeons of England2021
Time, cost and carbon-efficiency: a silver lining of COVID era virtual urology clinics?
Article in Annals of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 18 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
18 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 30 citations in OpenAlex.
- Green is the new gold: a systematic review of the environmental impact of urological procedures, telehealth, and conferences.The Canadian journal of urology · 2025Pooled it
- The Role of Virtual Consulting in Developing Environmentally Sustainable Health Care: Systematic Literature Review.Journal of medical Internet research · 2023Pooled it
- Narrative Review: Telemedicine for Reducing Travel-Related Out-of-Pocket Costs Among Hong Kong Urological Patients and a Customized Tiered Consultation Pathway.Research and reports in urology · 2026Review
- Effectiveness of Interventions to Reduce Carbon-Emissions Within Secondary Healthcare: Systematic Review and Evidence and Gap Map.Campbell systematic reviews · 2025Review
- Article
- Virtual Clinics in Cardiology: Do They Provide Equivalent Care and Reduce Travel?Journal of clinical medicine · 2025Article
- The carbon footprint of transperineal prostate biopsy.BJUI compass · 2025Article
- Aligning With the Goals of the Planetary Health Concept Regarding Ecological Sustainability and Digital Health: Scoping Review.Journal of medical Internet research · 2025Article
- Applications, benefits, and challenges of adopting teleurology: a scoping review.World journal of urology · 2025Article
- Estimating Patient and Family Costs and CO2 Emissions for Telehealth and In-Person Health Care Appointments in British Columbia, Canada: Geospatial Mixed Methods Study.Journal of medical Internet research · 2025Article
- Lowering the Carbon Footprint Through Telehealth Vasectomy Consults: A Retrospective Observational Study.Cureus · 2024Article
- The green and sustainable radiology department.Radiologie (Heidelberg, Germany) · 2023Review
- Impact of Cancer-Related Virtual Visits on Travel Distance, Travel Time, and Carbon Dioxide (COCurrent oncology (Toronto, Ont.) · 2023Article
- COVID-19 measures as an opportunity to reduce the environmental footprint in orthopaedic and trauma surgery.Frontiers in surgery · 2023Article
- Digital health for climate change mitigation and response: a scoping review.Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association : JAMIA · 2022Article
- Potential reduction in healthcare carbon footprint by autonomous artificial intelligence.NPJ digital medicine · 2022Article
- Telemedicine and Telehealth in Urology: Uptake, Impact and Barriers to Clinical Adoption.Frontiers in surgery · 2022Review
- Analyzing telehealth emissions and variations in primary care settings - A scoping review.The journal of climate change and healthReview
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
8 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
introductionThe COVID-19 pandemic has demanded radical changes in service delivery. Our centre adopted the use of outpatient telemedicine to reduce close-contact interactions between patients and staff. We hypothesised that incidental gains may be associated with this. We evaluated financial, practical and environmental implications of substituting virtual clinics (VCs) for in-person urology outpatient appointments.
methodsVCs were studied over a 3-month period. Based on patient-reported 'usual mode of transport' to the hospital, travel distance, time, petrol and parking costs, and the carbon emissions avoided by virtue of remote consultations were calculated. The underlying symptom/diagnosis and the 'effectiveness' of the VC were evaluated.
resultsOf 1,016 scheduled consultations, 736 (72.44%) were conducted by VCs over the study period. VCs resulted in an agreed treatment plan in 98.4% of a representative patient sample. The use of VCs was associated with an overall travel distance saving for patients of 31,038 miles (49,951km) over 3 months, with an average round-trip journey of 93.8 miles (151km) avoided for each rural-dwelling patient and an average financial saving of £25.91 (€28.70) per rural-dwelling car traveller. An estimated 1,257.8 hours of patient time were saved by avoidance of travel and clinic waiting times. Based on car-travelling patients alone, a 6.07-tonne reduction in carbon emissions was achieved with the use of VCs.
conclusionsIn appropriate clinical circumstances, VCs appear to provide efficiency across a number of domains. Future healthcare may involve offering outpatients the option of telemedicine as an alternative to physical attendance.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.