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. 2021 Dec;46(6):1124-1131.
doi: 10.1007/s10900-021-00996-z. Epub 2021 May 11.

Descriptive Analysis of a Telephone Based Community Monitoring Service for COVID-19

A C Clarke  1 , S Hull  2 , A I Semciw  3   4 , R L Jessup  3   4   5 , D Campbell  2 , A M Fabri  2 , N Tully  2 , C Bramston  2 , J Hayes  2
Affiliations

Descriptive Analysis of a Telephone Based Community Monitoring Service for COVID-19

A C Clarke et al. J Community Health. 2021 Dec.

Abstract

The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has required health services to rapidly respond to the needs of people diagnosed with the virus. Over 80% of people diagnosed with COVID-19 experience a mild illness and there is a need for community management to support these people in their home. In this paper we present, a telephone based COVID-19 community monitoring service developed in an Australian public health network, and we describe the rapid implementation of the service and the demographic and clinical characteristics of those enrolled. A retrospective mixed methods evaluation of the COVID-19 community monitoring service using the RE-AIM (Reach, Effectiveness, Adoption, Implementation, and Maintenance) framework. Eight hundred and fifty COVID-19 positive patients were enrolled, 54% female, 45% male, mean age 34 years SD 17. Four hundred and nine (48%) patients were born outside Australia. Among the 850 patients, 305 (36%) were classified as having a high risk of serious illness from COVID-19. The most prevalent risk factors were cardiovascular disease (37%), lung disease (30%) and age over 60 years (26%). The most common reported ongoing symptoms were fatigue (55%), breathing issues (26%) and mental health issues such as low mood (19%). There were no deaths in patients that participated in the service. The process of risk stratification undertaken with telephone triage was effective in determining risk of prolonged illness from COVID-19. Telephone monitoring by trained health professionals has a strong potential in the effective management of patients with a mild COVID-19 illness.

Keywords: Community health services; Community medicine; Telemedicine.

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Conflict of interest statement

Authors have no conflicts of interest to declare.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Patient flow
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
Patient age and gender distribution
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Symptom type in those that presented with prolonged symptoms (total sample = 105)
Fig. 4
Fig. 4
Relationship between risk category, sex, Socio-economic Indexes for Australia (SEIFA) and prolonged illness
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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