What is it about?
This study reviews a body of literature that examined unequal use of telemedicine among racial and ethnic minority groups during the pandemic. Our findings show that a larger number of studies reported increased telemedicine (video and/or telephone) use among Black and Hispanic groups, while a smaller number of studies reported less use or inconsistent use across examined groups. Among compositionally smaller minority groups, such as Asians, American Indian/Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islanders, fewer studies reported increased telemedicine use among these groups, while a larger number of studies reported decreased telemedicine use or inconsistent use across examined groups. We identified several factors that influenced telemedicine use among minority populations. These factors include access and ability to use digital technologies, provider attitudes towards telemedicine and biases towards minority groups, institutional preparedness to implement and effectively use telemedicine, community organizations that support digital technology use, and policies that stipulate continued use of telemedicine, both video and telephone visits.
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Why is it important?
There has been a rapid increase in the use of digital technologies in healthcare since the pandemic, and this increase has created a need to understand how minority populations are impacted. Our findings illustrate that while there have been areas of improvement for larger minority groups, such as Black and Hispanic groups, concerning telemedicine use, more work is needed to improve access and use among Asians and other compositionally smaller groups. These findings have important implications in the event of another high-utilization pandemic and highlight critical areas to address as technological advancements accelerate with the use of AI in healthcare delivery.
Perspectives
The idea for this work was born of an urgent need to understand how various minority groups were accessing and utilizing necessary healthcare during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. We're pleased to see the completion of this work and that it has been published to a broad audience. We are hopeful that it will catalyze important conversations around expanding digital access to healthcare for minority populations and enhancing the user experience of groups with limited exposure to digital health technologies.
John Meddar
New York University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Video-based telemedicine utilization patterns and associated factors among racial and ethnic minorities in the United States during the COVID-19 pandemic: A mixed-methods scoping review, PLOS Digital Health, July 2025, PLOS,
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pdig.0000952.
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