Virtual care improves access to primary care; however, the quality of care must not be adversely impacted by its use.

This is a mixed-design etiologic study using data from patients receiving primary care in a large, regional health system from January 2020 through December 2021. Eligible patients had at least one primary care contact. Eligible physicians had 10 or more patient contacts. The quartile of virtual visits per physician per month is calculated as the percentage of total visits conducted by phone or video (Q1 is the lowest). Six metrics used for value-based reimbursement were chosen for modeling with generalized linear mixed models.

Some quality metrics were modestly impacted by high virtual primary care usage; the absolute differences in rates were small. This may provide reassurance to physicians and their health systems that telemedicine use may not adversely impact quality metrics.

Segal, J. B., Yanek, L., Jager, L., Okoli, E., Hatef, E., Dada, M., & Frick, K. D. (2025). Higher Percentage of Virtual Primary Care Associated With Minimal Differences in Achievement of Quality Metrics. Medical care, 63(1), 70-76.