Ever had to wait in the waiting room for hours, just to have your name called and have a generic prescription or diagnosis that lasts no less than 5 minutes? This is the frustration felt by many that ultimately sparked the birth of online doctor consultations. Travel time and waiting time are eliminated with online doctor consultations, and they’re quickly becoming a popular choice for people who simply do not have the time to pay an actual visit to the doctors.
This article will discuss the several online doctor consultation services of 2019, and explain the wide range of variety in services that these online professional consultations can offer. We’re going to start off with the our top 5 picks for online doctor consultations.
Top 5 online doctor consultation services
Practo.com
App store rating: 4.7/5 (11.7K reviews)
Practo.com is a well established online doctor consultation website. According to their website, they offer an average of 50 million appointments per year in 15 countries, and each doctor profile listed on their website is verified for a professional medical license and qualifications. There’s a vast amount of specialists on practo.com, ranging from online dermatologists, online pediatricians, online therapists such as speech therapists and physiotherapists, and many more. Here’s how practo works - you explain your health concern, they make a suggestion based on your concerns, and you get matched with a suitable and certified online doctor. In addition, Practo.com prides themselves on the fact that users pay 50% lesser fees than offline appointments, with fees starting at just $14.99.
MDLIVE
App store rating: 4.7/5 (10.3K reviews)
Mdlive is a website and app offering online doctor consultations for over 50 minor illnesses, from medical illnesses, behavioral health illnesses, and dermatology related concerns. In addition, they offer prescription delivery services for customers to collect at their local pharmacy, provided they live in the U.S. and meet certain guidelines. Cost for online doctor consultations vary depending on whether it’s for online counseling, online psychiatry, and online dermatology. In any case, costs can be as low as $69 for an online consultation with a dermatologist, provided you have the right type of insurance.
Teladoc
App store rating: 4.8/5 (72.1K reviews)
Teladoc is an online doctor consultation service that enables users to speak to licensed doctors by web, phone or mobile app within minutes. According to their website, they have over 20 million members, with an impressive 10 minute median doctor response time, and a 92% rate of issues resolved after just the first visit. There are over 3,100+ licensed online healthcare professionals that users can reach out to, and their mobile app offers a convenient way for users to connect with online doctors through video call or voice call. In addition, Teladoc offers users to not only book an online doctors appointment, but also connect with online doctors for prescriptions to be sent to the user’s nearest pharmacy.
Dr. on demand
App store rating: 4.9/5 (14.7K reviews)
Dr. on demand is a relatively new online doctor consultation service established in 2018. Dr. on demand’s services are focused mainly on their smartphone app, where they offer useful features to users such as a one-on-one video consultation option with a professional online doctor, and even offer a flat rate of $75 for medical visits to users who have no health insurance. According to their website, they already have over 1 million registered users, and have a very impressive average rating of 4.9/5 for their providers.
Pacify
App store rating: 4.9/5 (448 reviews)
Pacify is a specialised online doctor consultation service that connects users with online maternal and pediatric experts. Members have the benefit of on-demand access to a nationwide network (within the US) to online specialists such as online pediatric nurses, online dietitians, and online lactation consultants, and all consultations are available 24/7. According to their site, the average time to connect with an online doctor is just 30 seconds, and they even offer multilingual support: English and Spanish. Pacify’s pricing is as follows: $39/month for their month-to-month option, or a flat rate of $199 for an annual membership. On top of this, they even offer free memberships depending on your health plan.
Book an online doctors appointment
Now that you’re well informed on the caliber of online doctor services offered in today's world, booking an online doctors appointment should be your next step. Of course, some of these services offer free online doctor consultations, but you must also be weary of how much information you can get from free consultations. In either case, whenever you have health related concerns, the last thing you should do is to put off a doctor’s appointment - reaching out to an online doctor will be the most efficient way to ensure you’re always in the healthiest condition as possible.
International online doctors
All the services above are great, however not many of them offer online doctor consultation services for anywhere outside of the United States. Luckily, there’s an app for doctors to start interacting with people from all around the world - Callmart: Communication Marketplace. Callmart is a C2C smartphone app that is essentially a platform for specialists to sell their services to people in over 155 countries, all with a single tap on the smartphone. The Callmart app has a convenient and secure system for transactions using a highly secured third party online payment service provider, and the app even enables users to get compensated automatically in 1 minute increments. For example, an online doctor sets a price per minute (i.e. $3 per minute) and within just 5 minutes of talk time, they get $15!
A Final Note
The abundance of online doctors today offers convenient consultations and online doctor appointments for everyone with a health concern, all while eliminating commuting and waiting time! Whenever you have a concern, make sure to use the various options available to you for online doctors - chat, call, video call, whatever it is - the options are vast and being able to take advantage of that is a perk that people did not have even just a decade ago.
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