Psychiatrists are significantly more likely than other doctors to use teleconsultation, according to statistics published Tuesday by Doctolib, whose platform accounts for just under half of French teleconsultations.
According to these figures, psychiatrists are particularly numerous in using teleconsultation: 63% of Doctolib's psychiatrists clients use this practice, compared to 42% of general practitioners, 46% of pediatricians, 29% of dermatologists, 41% of gynecologists (the study focuses on these five specialties).
And psychiatrists who use this particular form of consultation make significant use of it: 20.3% of their consultations take place in this way, while the proportion is only 8.1% for general practitioners, 5.1% for pediatricians, 4.8% for gynecologists, and 4.4% for dermatologists.
As for patients, they do not hesitate to make extensive use of teleconsultation when their psychiatrist offers it to them: 11% of these patients have not had any face-to-face consultations during the year, according to figures from Doctolib.
The Doctolib study also confirms that teleconsultation remains under-represented among doctors located in rural areas: only 28.4% of teleconsultations are carried out by rural doctors, while these doctors represent 47% of face-to-face consultations.
On the patient side, the study shows that women are over-represented: they represent 59.5% of teleconsultation patients, compared to 55.2% of face-to-face consultation patients.
Young adults aged 25 to 34 are also over-represented, with 27.3% of teleconsultation patients, while they only represent 15.3% of face-to-face consultations.
According to Doctolib, doctors who use teleconsultation tend to have a larger clientele.
General practitioners using teleconsultation have an active file (number of patients seen at least once a year) 37% higher than that of their counterparts who do not use it.
The gap is even greater for psychiatrists, where it reaches 41%.
The government is organizing a Teleconsultation Conference on June 27, which will notably assess the regulatory framework within which teleconsultation is evolving.
Overall, teleconsultation, which exploded during the health crisis, now represents less than one million consultations per month, or approximately 2% of the procedures carried out by doctors, according to figures from the Health Insurance.
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