NCT04593004

Teledermatology vs. Face-to-Face Visits in the Follow-Up of Patients With Acne

Randomized Open-Label Trial Comparing Teledermatology vs. Face-to-Face Consultation in the Follow-Up of Patients With Mild-to-Moderate Acne

• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 24 (actual)
• Sponsor: Insel Gruppe AG, University Hospital Bern · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years – 28 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Not accepted

Summary

Acne vulgaris is a common cutaneous inflammatory condition of sebaceous follicles that can profoundly affect patients' quality of life, especially at a young age. In this context the use of teledermatology can potentially reduce the healthcare costs associated to traditional consultations as well as the costs related to travel and loss of school/working time for the patient, with a clear benefit for the whole community. Since 2016, the Department of Dermatology at Inselspital Hospital in Bern has a portal and a smartphone app for online advice service. Hereby the investigators propose to explicitly investigate the efficacy of this system in reducing healthcare costs as compared to traditional face-to-face consultations, in a cohort of patients with mild-to-moderate acne vulgaris.

Conditions

• Acne Vulgaris

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
DEVICE	Teledermatology	Patients will be assessed and followed-up by trained physicians through a store-and-forward system (teledermatology online service - Evita® app), which allows patients to upload pictures of skin areas affected by acne as well as their symptoms or questions related to their disease.
OTHER	Face-to-face consultation	Patients will be assessed and followed-up by trained physicians through regular face-to-face outpatient consultations.

Timeline

• Start date: 2020-10-07
• Primary completion: 2022-06-20
• Completion: 2022-06-20
• First posted: 2020-10-19
• Last updated: 2024-12-06

Locations

1 site across 1 country: Switzerland