Regulator warns medical institutions about users’ rights during teleconsultations

The Healthcare Regulation Authority (ERS) warned healthcare providers on Monday to ensure users’ rights are protected during teleconsultations after a study found cases of non-compliance.

The warning from the supervisory authorities stresses that “user rights must be fully guaranteed” in this area, since teleconsultations “represent a form of medical care”.

The regulator warned that the user must be guaranteed adequate information and must obtain his prior, free and informed consent to provide assistance through teleconsultation.

In addition, units providing health services must ensure that teleconsultations are conducted under appropriate conditions to ensure the quality of medical care and ensure the user’s privacy during the consultation.

ERS also warns that users should be guaranteed access to clinical information obtained during teleconsultations, which should also be recorded in the relevant clinical file, and proof of attendance at the teleconsultation should this be required.

According to the ERS, users also have the right to follow-up care under the same conditions as for face-to-face consultations and, where the maximum guaranteed response time (TMGR) applies, compliance monitoring and timely access to care must be guaranteed and reasonable.

A study published in July found situations where procedures were not “fully in place to ensure that users’ rights are effectively respected when providing” teleconsultations.

According to this document, about 30% of medical institutions with telemedicine did not monitor compliance with TMRG for teleconsultations, and 17.1% did not comply with the obligation to obtain informed consent from users.

In practice, this means that “the guarantee of the right to timely/reasonable access to health care may be compromised,” the regulator warned in the study.

TMRG monitoring was only possible for 70.3% of health facilities in the public sector and 42.9% in the private, social and cooperative sectors that provided teleconsultations.

The ERS stressed that teleconsultations, as a form of providing health care, should not be treated differently from face-to-face consultations, “which is why the TMRG provided for” in the legislation applies to them.

There were situations where healthcare providers “did not comply with the obligation to obtain informed, free and informed consent (17.1% of institutions),” the document also said, adding that not all healthcare institutions comply with informed consent for the user’s clinical process, “a situation that also requires correction.”

Regarding the right to access clinical information, ERS found that 34.5% of institutions did not record information obtained as a result of teleconsultation.