Telemedicine Consultations: Mediatization of Doctor-to-Patient Practices

The COVID-19 pandemic has geared up the ingression of medicine digitalization in the practice of patient and doctor interaction. Telemedicine consultation moves to become routine. While the law on telemedicine assigns this practice to medical institutions, existing practices of telemedicine consultations aim for non- institutional doctor-to-patient interaction as well. Which may defined as mediatization of medicine. There are two digital media discourses whose goal is to attract the patient's attention. The personal discourse of a doctor trying to promote himself and the media discourse of a clinic competing for the patient. Both practices synergisticly work successfully to form positive doctors' image. This study aims to examine how the digital technology impacts the doctor-patient relationship and its manifestations. Primary research based on a qualitative sociological analysis of 10 in-depth interviews revealed the difference between existing individual and institutional practices of interaction with the patient in digital media.