Umano GR, Di Sessa A, Guarino S, Gaudino G, Marzuillo P, Miraglia del Giudice E. Telemedicine in the COVID-19 era: Taking care of children with obesity and diabetes mellitus. World J Diabetes 2021; 12(5): 651-657 [PMID: 33995852 DOI: 10.4239/wjd.v12.i5.651]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Pierluigi Marzuillo, MD, PhD, Research Assistant Professor, Department of Woman, Child, and of General and Specialized Surgery, University of Campania “Luigi Vanvitelli”, Via L. De Crecchio 2, Naples 80138, Italy. pierluigi.marzuillo@gmail.com
Research Domain of This Article
Pediatrics
Article-Type of This Article
Minireviews
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
World J Diabetes. May 15, 2021; 12(5): 651-657 Published online May 15, 2021. doi: 10.4239/wjd.v12.i5.651
Telemedicine in the COVID-19 era: Taking care of children with obesity and diabetes mellitus
Giuseppina Rosaria Umano, Anna Di Sessa, Stefano Guarino, Giuseppina Gaudino, Pierluigi Marzuillo, Emanuele Miraglia del Giudice
Giuseppina Rosaria Umano, Anna Di Sessa, Stefano Guarino, Giuseppina Gaudino, Pierluigi Marzuillo, Emanuele Miraglia del Giudice, Department of Woman, Child, and of General and Specialized Surgery, University of Campania “Luigi Vanvitelli”, Naples 80138, Italy
Author contributions: All the authors contributed to bibliographic research and to the writing and editing of the manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: Nothing to declare.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Pierluigi Marzuillo, MD, PhD, Research Assistant Professor, Department of Woman, Child, and of General and Specialized Surgery, University of Campania “Luigi Vanvitelli”, Via L. De Crecchio 2, Naples 80138, Italy. pierluigi.marzuillo@gmail.com
Received: January 27, 2021 Peer-review started: January 27, 2021 First decision: February 25, 2021 Revised: March 1, 2021 Accepted: April 13, 2021 Article in press: April 13, 2021 Published online: May 15, 2021 Processing time: 98 Days and 14.4 Hours
Abstract
Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 infection was declared a pandemic in January 2020. Since then, several measures to limit virus transmission have been imposed; among them, home confinement has been the most severe, with drastic changes in the daily routines of the general population. The “stay at home” rule has impaired healthcare service access, and patients with chronic conditions were the most exposed to the negative effects of this limitation. There is strong evidence of the worsening of obesity and diabetes mellitus in children during this period. To overcome these issues, healthcare providers have changed their clinical practice to ensure follow-up visits and medical consultation though the use of telemedicine. Telemedicine, including telephone calls, videocalls, data platforms of shared telemedicine data platforms mitigated the negative effect of pandemic restrictions. Published evidence has documented good metabolic control and weight management outcomes in centers that performed extensive telemedicine services last year during the pandemic. This review discusses studies that investigated the use of telemedicine tools for the management of pediatric obesity and diabetes.
Core Tip: Quarantine confinement during the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic has negatively impacted patient wellbeing because of difficulties in attending medical consultations. Healthcare providers have offered telemedicine support for patients with chronic diseases, such as children with obesity and diabetes, to overcome this obstacle. Telemedicine has been shown to be effective in ensuring continuity of healthcare. Improvements are needed to reduce challenges to social inequalities in telehealth accessibility.
