A nurse calls the on-call physician in the middle of the night about a patient she is unsure of. A relative sits alone with a sick child, waiting for the ambulance. A patient with a chronic condition has to take half a day off work for a fifteen minute check-up. In all three situations, video solves something a phone call cannot: it gives the other person a look into the situation, not just a description of it.
Healthcare has spent the last few years working out exactly where that look makes a genuine difference, and where it does not. The answer is more nuanced than "video is good", but the pattern is clear once you look at both research and practice.
Photo: Vestre Viken HF
Video makes the biggest difference when distance, vulnerability, or time is the real barrier to contact, not the clinical content of the conversation itself. Region Midtjylland gathered input from healthcare professionals on when video consultations make the most sense, and the picture that emerges is clear. For chronic conditions requiring frequent contact, such as heart disease, COPD, or cancer, a short video call can replace a physical check-up while still offering reassurance and reducing infection risk.
For patients living far from the treatment site, video saves both travel time and money. For vulnerable patients with weakened immune systems or significant pain, video reduces the burden of the journey itself. And when older medical patients are being discharged, video can coordinate between hospital, municipality, and family, making the transition safer.
What these examples share is that the relationship between clinician and patient is already established. Healthcare professionals in the study report that video works best when they have met the patient before and understand their circumstances. It is not video itself that builds trust, it is video as an extension of a relationship that already exists.
In acute care, the time window is too short to build a relationship first, so video has to do something different: give the person making the decision a direct look at the situation immediately. That is the core of IncidentShare VideoLink. Paramedics call the on-call physician on a regular phone first, then send a secure video link directly from IncidentShare, with nothing for the physician to install. The design exists precisely because ambulance crews prefer a dedicated app for daily use, while a physician in the middle of a shift rarely has the chance to install and log into another system. Video needs to work the moment it is needed, not after an installation process.
The effect has been measured, not assumed. At AMK Vestre Viken, video changed the clinical assessment in close to half of the cases where it was used, and the treatment plan in nearly one in three. In an earlier pilot at the same service, 1,631 video calls were completed out of 2,066 attempts, and 93 percent of operators in a survey of 143 staff said video was useful in the emergency call. This lines up with the broader debate on prehospital video in Norway, where voices in the healthcare sector have called for video consultation to become a standard part of prehospital care rather than the exception.
Independent research points the same way. A cluster randomized trial run across four months at the emergency dispatch centre for Denmark's Central Region, covering 1.3 million residents, compared video streaming with telephone only communication across nearly 19,000 calls. Dispatchers using video reduced highest urgency ambulance dispatches by five percentage points and cut 24 hour hospital admissions among patients initially not sent an ambulance by two percentage points, all without any measurable change in 30 day mortality or intensive care admissions. Calls ran about half a minute longer on average when video was used, a modest cost for triage that better matched what crews found on scene. It is the first trial of its size to test video against telephone head to head under normal operating conditions rather than a curated pilot, which makes the result harder to dismiss as a best case scenario.
Region Midtjylland's findings suggest video strengthens the relational dimension compared with a phone call, because sight comes into play. Several healthcare professionals describe how a short video check-in can follow up with a patient without costing either clinician or patient much time. At the same time, the recommendation is not to replace all physical visits with video.
In many situations a combination works best, with video handling frequent, short contacts while physical visits are reserved for cases that genuinely require a clinical examination. In some settings, video is also paired with home measurements such as blood pressure or infection markers, giving the clinician a fuller picture without requiring the patient to attend in person.
The biggest barrier is that video reduces access to the senses a clinician normally relies on when meeting a patient. That places demands on good questioning technique, to compensate for what cannot be seen or sensed through a screen.
It also requires a certain level of digital competence from the patient, or a relative who can help. Neither is insurmountable, but both need to be planned for when a department decides when video is the right choice, and when it is not.
Can video replace all physical visits in healthcare?
No. The evidence points to a combination, where video handles frequent, short contacts and follow-up, while physical visits are reserved for cases that require a clinical examination.
Does video consultation require the patient to have met the clinician before?
It is not a requirement, but healthcare professionals report that video works best when a relationship is already established, because the clinician already understands the patient's circumstances.
How does prehospital video differ from ordinary video consultations?
Prehospital video, such as IncidentShare VideoLink, is built for acute situations where there is no time to build a relationship first. The focus is a fast, secure look into the situation, not a planned conversation.
Is it safe to base dispatch decisions on video instead of a phone call alone?
The strongest evidence so far says yes. In the large Danish trial described above, adding video did not increase 30 day mortality or intensive care admissions compared with telephone only dispatch, while triage accuracy improved and unnecessary highest urgency dispatches went down.
Key takeaways
Video makes a difference in healthcare when it solves a real problem: distance, vulnerability, time pressure, or an acute need to see a situation immediately. In planned care, video strengthens the relationship and saves time when it builds on an existing contact. In acute and prehospital care, the value is different: a direct look in the moment a decision has to be made. Both require the technology to be simple enough to use under pressure, which is exactly what IncidentShare VideoLink is built for.
If your department is considering video in prehospital care, you can read more about IncidentShare, see how other healthcare services are already using the platform, or book a no-obligation conversation about what it could look like for you.