In the last few years, an increasing number of patients have eschewed in-person medical consultations in favor of teleconsultations—medical consultations performed through dedicated healthcare portals and apps, and/or consumer videocalling platforms such as WhatsApp, Zoom, and Skype, Juniper Research noted in a recent whitepaper, “The Doctor Is Always In: How Teleconsultations Improve Patient Care.”

Juniper expects the total number of teleconsultations performed around the world to reach 765 million in 2025, up from 348 million in 2020; a CAGR of 17.1 percent across the forecast period. This adoption rate, however, was significantly accelerated in 2020 by the advent of COVID-19, which left many people unable to access health resources due to either their vulnerability to the virus or because lockdown restrictions meant that they were unable to leave their homes.

Around the world, many governments responded to the closure and newfound inaccessibility of healthcare facilities by loosening previous restrictions on the practice of telemedicine, in particular, teleconsultations. This decision, perhaps unsurprisingly, resulted in mass adoption of these services among patients and providers globally.

By relocating the site of healthcare delivery from primary care clinics and other healthcare facilities, teleconsultations reduce the number of barriers that might ordinarily prevent patients from seeking medical attention: appointments can be booked remotely and at a date and time that is convenient for them, while the consultation itself does not require them to travel or otherwise leave their home.

As a result, teleconsultations have been shown to significantly improve people’s health, Juniper observed. In addition to reducing the number of healthcare barriers, teleconsultation services enable providers to consult with more patients than they otherwise would be able to in a face-to-face setting, which does not only reduce waiting times, but also enables patients to receive their diagnosis and treatment(s) faster, a factor that is vital in the context of health conditions such as cancer, where early treatment is essential to prevent the disease from spreading further.