ArticleBMJ open2023
Changes in consultation mode during different phases of the COVID-19 pandemic in Croatian family medicine: a cross-sectional study.
Article in BMJ open, 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 7 papers.
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Who cites it
7 citing papers in PubMed.
- Contacts with Patients in Croatian Family Medicine Practices-What Has Changed from 2019 to 2025?Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- How far on the road? The role of family medicine/general practice in 10 Central and Eastern European countries: A mixed-method study.The European journal of general practice · 2025Article
- Managing consultation duration in primary care: A systematic review with health equity insights.Journal of family medicine and primary care · 2025Review
- The use of telemedicine in family medicine: a scoping review.BMC health services research · 2025Article
- Insights into general practitioners' self-care across 38 countries during the pandemic: a cross-sectional study.BMC psychology · 2024Article
- The Attitudes and Practices Regarding COVID-19 among General Practitioners from Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina: A Cross-Sectional Study.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2023Article
- Family Physicians' Perceptions of Primary Health Care Use in Bosnia and Herzegovina during the Covid-19 Pandemic, a Cross-sectional Study.Acta medica academica · 2023Article
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectivesTo describe the changes in the type, length and reasons for consultations in primary healthcare during the COVID-19 pandemic in Croatia. This study aimed to test a hypothesis regarding the increased workload of general practitioners (GPs) by introducing more virtual consultations (VCs).
designThe study design was cross-sectional and comprised two phases: retrospective and prospective. The retrospective phase included data from April, May and June of 2019, 2020 and 2021, and the prospective phase included data from 2 weeks in June 2021. Additionally, the number, length and reasons for face-to-face consultations (FTFC), VCs and telephone consultations (TCs) with nurses were collected. SETTING AND
participantsOverall, 6 GPs from different regions in Croatia with 10 125 enlisted patients. MAIN OUTCOMES MEASURES: The retrospective phase compared data for consultation types obtained from electronic medical records. The prospective phase collected the number, length and reasons for FTFCs, VCs and TCs with nurses.
resultsFTFCs decreased from 58.1% of the total number of visits in 2019 to 41.2% in 2020, while VC increased from 41.9% in 2019 to 58.8% in 2020. Furthermore, an eightfold increase in email consultations was recorded. The average lengths of an FTFC and TC were 7.13±3.38 and 4.01±2.09 min, respectively; FTFCs were significantly longer than TCs (t=7.038, p<0.0001). There was an increase in the total workload (9.4%) in 2021 compared with 2019.
conclusionCroatian GPs faced changes in work organisation along with increased workload during the pandemic. Despite the shortening of time in FTFCs, the workload has increased due to the increase in VCs. An appropriate legal framework should be implemented for this new form of consultation. Future research is needed to address the impact of these changes on healthcare quality.
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