Healthcare Providers’ Experience with Saudi Arabia’s 937 Virtual Medical Call Centers and Telehealth

Figures & data

Table 1 Demographic, and Occupational Related Characteristic Among HCPs

Demographic Variable	Category	Frequency (F)	Percentage (%)
Gender	Male	163	39.7
	Female	248	60.3
Nationality	Saudi	150	36.5
	Non-Saudi	261	63.5
Specialty	Family Medicine	213	51.8
	Emergency Medicine	11	2.7
	General Practitioners	90	21.9
	Others	140	33.6
Age	20-<30	46	11.2
	30-<40	152	37
	40-<50	144	65
	50-<60	52	12.7
	60 or older	17	4.1

Table 2 Evaluation of the Service Provided by 937-Call Center in KSA

Evaluation Item	Strongly Agree (%)	Agree (%)	Neutral (%)	Disagree (%)	Strongly Disagree (%)	Total (%)
Achieves patient needs more quickly	32.8	43.8	15.6	5.6	2.2	100
Increases access to care	52.8	37.5	6.6	2.2	1	100
More productive than in-person visits	24.8	34.3	25.1	12.9	2.9	100
Comfortable interacting with patients	42.3	38.9	12.4	4.6	1.7	100
Ease of accessing patient records	11.9	18	21.4	28.7	11.9	100
Maintains patient data confidentiality	51.3	25.1	8.5	1.7	16.4	100
Acceptable way to provide healthcare services	47.9	39.4	8	2.4	2.2	100

Table 3 The Correlation Between the Three Evaluation Items

Variable Pair	Correlation Coefficient (r)	p-value
PU and PEU	0.58	p < 0.001***
PU and PE	0.59	p < 0.001***
PEU and PE	0.57	p < 0.001***
SFU and PE	0.69	p < 0.001***

Notes: Significance levels: p < 0.05, **p < 0.01, ***p < 0.001.

Abbreviations: PU, Perceived Usefulness; PEU, Perceived Ease of Use; PE, Perceived Effectiveness; SFU, Satisfaction and Future Use.

Table 4 The Concerns and Challenges, the Areas of Improvement in the 937 Medical Call Centers

Category	Description	Frequency (F)	Percentage (%)
Concerns and Challenges
Difficult to provide accurate medical assessments	Difficulties in accurately assessing medical conditions remotely	169	41.1
Lack of clear regulations and rules for telehealth services	Insufficient telehealth regulations and guidelines	104	25.3
Lack of management support	Inadequate support from management	69	16.8
Overlapping of consultations	Scheduling conflicts and overlapping appointments	68	16.5
Lack of technical training	Insufficient training on telehealth technologies	29	7.1
Difficult to use technology and technical devices	Challenges in using telehealth devices and technology	25	6.1
Data privacy and security	Concerns about data privacy and security	24	5.8
Other	Other unspecified challenges	47	11.4
Areas for Improvement			38.2
Integration and connection with other electronic systems (eg, electronic health records)	Better integration with existing electronic health records	157	25.5
Continuity of care	Ensuring continuity of care	105	19.2
Technical aspects of the app (eg, quality of voice)	Improving technical aspects of the telehealth application	79	61.3
Involvement of medical specialists (eg, psychiatrist, dermatologist, oncologists)	Increasing involvement of various medical specialists	252	36.7
Access to patient data	Improving access to patient data	151	45.7
Other	Other unspecified areas for improvement	188	45.7
Additional Comments
Expanding work within 937 to include renewing prescriptions and transferring to hospitals	Expanding services to include prescription renewals and hospital transfers	3	0.6
Improving care system	General improvements to the care system	2	0.4
Need more psychiatric doctor – add pharmacist	Increasing the number of psychiatric doctors and adding pharmacists	2	0.4
Infrastructure (poor internet, old computer devices, periodic maintenance of computers, add video)	Improving infrastructure including internet and computer devices, and adding video capabilities	6	1.2
Duration of consultation	Adjusting the duration of consultations	5	1.0
Patients related (health education, quality of patient’s questions are high, use of the services)	Enhancing patient-related services including health education and quality of patient questions	3	0.6
Need guideline, updated references, and required training	Providing guidelines, updated references, and necessary training	3	0.6
Working time (work more hours, and others 4 hours)	Adjusting working hours	2	0.4
Tracking and blocking calls from inappropriate callers	Implementing tracking and blocking for inappropriate callers	1	0.2
Excessive surveys - Difficulty in providing service due to many forms to fill out	Reducing the number of surveys and forms required for service	3	0.6
Assigning doctors to provide services not within their specialty, such as pharmaceutical consultation	Ensuring doctors provide services within their specialty	2	0.4
Not dealing with inappropriate calls	Addressing issues with inappropriate calls	2	0.4

Data Sharing Statement

The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.