Teledermatology May Benefit Marginalized Populations: National and Institutional Trends during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Introduction Limited data exist regarding demographic-specific teledermatology (TD) utilization during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. This study aimed to determine TD utilization trends during the pandemic. Methods A retrospective cohort study for national and institutional populations was conducted. Patient encounters in the American Academy of Dermatology’s DataDerm registry (DataDerm) were analyzed from 1 April 2020 through 30 June 2021. All dermatological patients seen by Duke University Health Systems (DUHS) were analyzed from 1 March 2020 through 30 April 2021. In-person clinic visits versus TD encounters (national and institutional) and no-show rates (institutional only) were collected for visit type (i.e., TD versus in-person), sex, race, age/generation, and in- versus out-of-state location (national only). TD utilization is defined as the cohort of interest using TD (e.g., females, whites) within a demographic group (i.e., sex, race) as a percentage of total TD users. This was compared with in-person utilization during the identical timeframe. Results For US national data, 13,964,816 encounters were analyzed. Sex, race, age, and location each had a significant association with TD utilization (adjusted p