| Popis: |
Background: The number of clinics offering telemedicine in Japan has been increasing. Regional characteristics such as population density and the number of physicians may be associated with the provision of telemedicine. This study investigated the relationship between clinics offering telemedicine and such regional characteristics for each prefecture in Japan. Methods: Data were collected from publicly available information that included the percentage of clinics offering telemedicine (real-time synchronous type) among all clinics (in 2022), population density, and the number of physicians for each of Japan's 47 prefectures. An ecological study was carried out to determine the correlation between the percentage of clinics offering telemedicine and regional characteristics for each prefecture, and Pearson correlation analysis and multiple regression analysis adjusted for regional characteristics were performed. Results: The min?max and mean levels were, respectively, 3.4?39.2% and 15.6% of clinics offering telemedicine, 66.6?6402.6 and 657.1 people per square kilometer of population density, and 185.2?356.7 and 274.0 physicians per 100,000 people. Geographically, the northeastern regions appeared to show a high percentage of clinics offering telemedicine relative to the southwestern regions. There was a significant negative correlation between the percentage of clinics offering telemedicine and population density (r?=??0.31, p?0.05; ??=??0.31, p?
|
