Evaluating the Comparative Effectiveness of Telemedicine in Primary Care: Learning from the COVID-19 Pandemic, New York, 2021 (ICPSR 39346)

Version Date: Jul 1, 2025

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Principal Investigator(s):
Jessica Ancker, Vanderbilt University. School of Medicine; Rainu Kaushal, Cornell University. Weill Cornell Medical College

https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR39346.v1

Version V1

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Summary

During the COVID-19 pandemic, telemedicine emerged as the primary method of providing outpatient care in many regions with shelter-in-place and social distancing policies. This study aimed understand the impact of this rapid and widespread transition from in-person to remote visits on disparities in access to primary care, especially in chronic disease where ongoing communication between providers and patients is essential.

The newly developed or expanded telemedicine programs varied widely, raising questions about the effect of these differences on uptake of telemedicine among different patient populations and on patient-centered outcomes. Leveraging a natural experiment approach, this study examined rapidly changing telemedicine and in-person models of care during and after the COVID-19 crisis to determine whether certain patients could safely choose to continue telemedicine or telemedicine-supplemented care, rather than return to in-person care.

Citation

Ancker, Jessica, and Kaushal, Rainu. Evaluating the Comparative Effectiveness of Telemedicine in Primary Care: Learning from the COVID-19 Pandemic, New York, 2021. Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research [distributor], 2025-07-01. https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR39346.v1

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Funding

Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI) (COVID-2020C2-10791)

Subject Terms

Geographic Coverage

Restrictions

Access to these data is restricted. Users interested in obtaining these data must complete a Restricted Data Use Agreement, specify the reason for the request, and obtain IRB approval or notice of exemption for their research.

Distributor(s)

Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research
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Time Period(s)

2021

Date of Collection

2021-11

Data Collection Notes

  1. This study includes 111 variables total for both English and Spanish responses. The Spanish responses share the same variable name as the English responses, but to make them distinguishable, "_V2" has been appended to the end of each variable name. In the data, these variables are grouped together in some instances, but also follow one another in other instances.

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Study Purpose

The purpose of this study was to understand the impact of the rapid and widespread transition from in-person to remote visits on disparities in access to primary care.

Study Design

A survey was developed to collect patient-reported outcomes (PROs) through REDCap surveys at Weill Cornell Medicine, delivered via a patient portal. The research team collected PROs on patient experiences based on the Patient Satisfaction Questionnaire (PSQ-18) (5-point subscale), which includes patient satisfaction, communication quality with providers, and accessibility/convenience of care.

For individuals who accessed a telemedicine visit, the survey asked questions adapted from the validated Telemedicine Usability Questionnaire (TUQ), including the ease of use and access to the telemedicine service, quality of the interaction with the provider, and satisfaction.

Sample

The survey was fielded to adult patients 18 years of age and older, who received an in-person or telemedicine visit at any primary care practice affiliated with Weill Cornell Medicine (WCM), a large academic health care system in New York, NY.

For Weill Cornell patients, during the Epic MyChart (also known as Connect) eCheck-In, patients were given the opportunity to indicate their preference (Yes, No, or Undecided) and signed a consent form to consent to be contacted for research.

Only individuals that agreed to be contacted for research were emailed the survey through REDCap.

Time Method

Cross-sectional

Universe

Adult patients who received an in-person or telemedicine visit at any primary care practice affiliated with Weill Cornell Medicine (WCM) in New York, NY.

Unit(s) of Observation

Individual

Data Type(s)

Mode of Data Collection

Description of Variables

This data included variables regarding patient characteristics, reasons for patients' visits, perceptions of patient-clinician communication and quality of the visit.

Presence of Common Scales

  • Patient Satisfaction Questionnaire (PSQ-18) (5-point subscale)
  • Telemedicine Usability Questionnaire (TUQ)

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    Original Release Date

    2025-07-01

    Version History

    2025-07-01 ICPSR data undergo a confidentiality review and are altered when necessary to limit the risk of disclosure. ICPSR also routinely creates ready-to-go data files along with setups in the major statistical software formats as well as standard codebooks to accompany the data. In addition to these procedures, ICPSR performed the following processing steps for this data collection:

    • Checked for undocumented or out-of-range codes.

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    Notes

    • The public-use data files in this collection are available for access by the general public. Access does not require affiliation with an ICPSR member institution.

    • ICPSR usually offers files in multiple formats for researchers to be able to access data and documentation in formats that work well within their needs. If you have questions about the accessibility of materials distributed by ICPSR or require further assistance, please visit ICPSR’s Accessibility Center.

    • One or more files in this data collection have special restrictions. Restricted data files are not available for direct download from the website; click on the Restricted Data button to learn more.