EXPLORING HEALTHCARE ACCESS IN TELEHEALTH THROUGH SPANISH-SPEAKING PATIENTS’ PERSPECTIVES

Background: Telehealth offers a potential solution to addressing access barriers experienced by Spanish-speaking patients. This scoping review aimed to explore whether a comprehensive view of healthcare access is being considered when creating telehealth programs for Spanish-speakers. The Conceptual Framework of Access to Healthcare (Levesque et al., 2013) was used to guide access analysis. Methods: A literature search was conducted across three databases to identify empirical studies in the United States that reported Spanish-speaking patients’ perspectives of telehealth through quantitative questions. Data was collected from the included articles to characterize the type of healthcare providers and telehealth modalities examined in the research. Results: Thirteen articles met inclusion criteria. In total, 126 quantitative patient-perspective questions were extracted from the articles to determine the corresponding access category from the Conceptual Framework of Access to Healthcare. Across the articles, appropriateness was the most addressed category. No article considered all ten access categories. Discussion: Few provider groups have explored Spanish-speaking patients’ perspectives of telehealth, and several areas of the Conceptual Framework of Access to Healthcare were minimally investigated. It is imperative that more areas of healthcare consider a multi-dimensional view of access when developing telehealth programs to ensure all patient populations can truly access services.