%0 Journal Article
%@ 2369-2960
%I JMIR Publications
%V 7
%N 2
%P e24445
%T Telehealth Demand Trends During the COVID-19 Pandemic in the Top 50 Most Affected Countries: Infodemiological Evaluation
%A Wong,Mark Yu Zheng
%A Gunasekeran,Dinesh Visva
%A Nusinovici,Simon
%A Sabanayagam,Charumathi
%A Yeo,Khung Keong
%A Cheng,Ching-Yu
%A Tham,Yih-Chung
%+ Singapore Eye Research Institute, Singapore National Eye Centre, 20 College Road Discovery Tower, Level 6, The Academia, Singapore, 169856, Singapore, 65 6576 7200, tham.yih.chung@seri.com.sg
%K COVID-19
%K infodemiology
%K telehealth
%K telemedicine
%K internet
%D 2021
%7 19.2.2021
%9 Original Paper
%J JMIR Public Health Surveill
%G English
%X Background: The COVID-19 pandemic has led to urgent calls for the adoption of telehealth solutions. However, public interest and demand for telehealth during the pandemic remain unknown. Objective: We used an infodemiological approach to estimate the worldwide demand for telehealth services during COVID-19, focusing on the 50 most affected countries and comparing the demand for such services with the level of information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructure available. Methods: We used Google Trends, the Baidu Index (China), and Yandex Keyword Statistics (Russia) to extract data on worldwide and individual countries’ telehealth-related internet searches from January 1 to July 7, 2020, presented as relative search volumes (RSV; range 0-100). Daily COVID-19 cases and deaths were retrieved from the World Health Organization. Individual countries’ ICT infrastructure profiles were retrieved from the World Economic Forum Report. Results: Across the 50 countries, the mean RSV was 18.5 (SD 23.2), and the mean ICT index was 62.1 (SD 15.0). An overall spike in worldwide telehealth-related RSVs was observed from March 11, 2020 (RSV peaked to 76.0), which then tailed off in June-July 2020 (mean RSV for the period was 25.8), but remained higher than pre-March RSVs (mean 7.29). By country, 42 (84%) manifested increased RSVs over the evaluation period, with the highest observed in Canada (RSV=100) and the United States (RSV=96). When evaluating associations between RSV and the ICT index, both the United States and Canada demonstrated high RSVs and ICT scores (≥70.3). In contrast, European countries had relatively lower RSVs (range 3.4-19.5) despite high ICT index scores (mean 70.3). Several Latin American (Brazil, Chile, Colombia) and South Asian (India, Bangladesh, Pakistan) countries demonstrated relatively higher RSVs (range 13.8-73.3) but low ICT index scores (mean 44.6), indicating that the telehealth demand outstrips the current ICT infrastructure. Conclusions: There is generally increased interest and demand for telehealth services across the 50 countries most affected by COVID-19, highlighting the need to scale up telehealth capabilities, during and beyond the pandemic. 
%M 33605883
%R 10.2196/24445
%U http://publichealth.jmir.org/2021/2/e24445/
%U https://doi.org/10.2196/24445
%U http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33605883