Telemedicine and Time Management in Primary-Care
6-11, July, 2025, Rabat, Morocco
Caring for Healthcare Professionals
RC15 Sociology of Health (host committee)
RC52 Sociology of Professional Groups
Telemedicine and time management in primary-care
Prof. Ariela Popper-Giveon, The David Yellin Academic College of Education, Jerusalem, Israel. Email: Giveon@dyellin.ac.il
Prof. Yael Keshet, Western Galilee College, Israel. Email: yaelk@wgalil.ac.il
In primary care, time limits on consultation is a key constraint on the delivery of good care since the length of patient–physician consultation impacts its quality. The impact of time limits also extends to the personal sphere and leads to physicians' heavy workload, stress, and burnout. Information and communication technologies were found to enable workers to structure work in novel ways, allow for better time management, and increase work scheduling autonomy. The lecture presents a research that examined the experiences of time management of primary-care physicians when using telemedicine, a type of information and communication technologies, in their communication with patients.
During 2023 in-depth interviews were conducted with 20 Israeli primary-care physicians: family physicians and pediatricians. Telemedicine technologies were described as impacting their time management in the context of work–life balance, allowing them to manage their time during and between appointments. However, the interviviewed PCPs feel that some of their telemedicine work hours are not appropriately compensated, which makes them particularly cost-effective for the organization.
The findings point that telemedicine can allow for better time management, increase work scheduling autonomy and contribute to professionals' wellbeing. Based on our findings we recommend to integrate telemedicine technologies designed to increase physicians' work scheduling autonomy, and to pay for all their working hours. The feelings that their basic needs are met and that they can better manage their time may increase their well-being and prevent burnout.