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Three years of tele-emergency medicine with mobile on-site audio-video streaming in lower Saxony, Germany - descriptive results of a longitudinal secondary data analysis.

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  • Additional Information
    • Source:
      Publisher: BioMed Central Country of Publication: England NLM ID: 100968543 Publication Model: Electronic Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1471-227X (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 1471227X NLM ISO Abbreviation: BMC Emerg Med Subsets: MEDLINE
    • Publication Information:
      Original Publication: London : BioMed Central, [2001-
    • Subject Terms:
      Telemedicine*/statistics & numerical data ; Emergency Medical Services*/methods ; Emergency Medical Services*/statistics & numerical data ; Videoconferencing*/statistics & numerical data ; Physicians*/statistics & numerical data ; Physicians*/supply & distribution ; Emergency Medicine*/methods ; Emergency Medicine*/statistics & numerical data; Germany ; Longitudinal Studies ; Secondary Data Analysis ; Retrospective Studies ; Humans ; Mobile Health Units/statistics & numerical data ; Pilot Projects
    • Abstract:
      Competing Interests: Declarations. Ethics approval and consent to participate: The Medical Ethics Committee of the University of Oldenburg assessed that, according to Sect. 15 of the Professional Code of Conduct, there was no legal or professional obligation to provide an opinion, as the study merely involved the analysis of anonymous data or body materials that could not be assigned to a specific person. (File number: 2021 − 152). Consent for publication: Not applicable. Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests.
      Background: Pre-hospital emergency medicine has been facing major challenges for several years due to increasing numbers of emergency calls, limited personnel resources and difficulties in staffing. A tele-emergency physician system provides immediate on-site emergency medical assistance and can support and guide emergency service personnel directly, thereby promoting the optimal use of available resources. Since January 2021, tele-emergency physicians have been deployed as part of a pilot project in the Goslar district in Lower Saxony, Germany. The aim of this study was to conduct a descriptive analysis of changes in on-site emergency physician missions and tele-emergency physician missions between 2021 and 2023.
      Methods: To address this research question, a retrospective secondary data analysis of mission protocols was conducted. After data preparation, a descriptive data analysis was performed. Correlation analyses were conducted to compare on-site emergency physician missions and tele-emergency physician missions. Additionally, a technology questionnaire was completed by the tele-emergency physicians after every mission over a period of one and a half years and descriptively analysed to assess connection interruptions during tele-emergency physician missions.
      Results: From 2021 to 2023, annual on-site emergency physician missions decreased from 5210 to 3623, and tele-emergency physician missions declined from 1632 to 1066. In terms of mission and treatment durations, there was a statistically significant difference between on-site emergency physician and tele-emergency physician missions across all three years. Between 1 May 2022 and 31 October 2023, 3.3% of tele-emergency physician missions were interrupted.
      Conclusion: The findings from this pilot project confirm existing data from other studies and demonstrate that tele-emergency physician systems are an efficient resource in pre-hospital emergency medical services. They relieve emergency physicians in low-priority cases and, after an initial learning curve, from higher-priority cases as well. Furthermore, tele-emergency physicians can be deployed across all diagnostic categories.
      Clinical Trial Number: Not applicable - secondary data analysis.
      (© 2025. The Author(s).)
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    • Contributed Indexing:
      Keywords: Emergency medical services; Implementation; Pre-hospital emergency medicine; Secondary data analysis; Tele-emergency physician; Telemedicine
    • Publication Date:
      Date Created: 20250714 Date Completed: 20250723 Latest Revision: 20250723
    • Publication Date:
      20250723
    • Accession Number:
      PMC12261602
    • Accession Number:
      10.1186/s12873-025-01286-w
    • Accession Number:
      40660138