The maladiecoronavirus.fr web application is a self-triage tool for suspected COVID-19 cases. It was the first application to be approved by the French Ministry of Health in March 2020, and has since been used by almost 13 million people. A study has demonstrated that use of maladiecoronavirus.fr led to an eightfold reduction in the number of unnecessary calls to the French medical emergency number (15).
The maladiecoronavirus.fr public web application, launched on March 20, 2020, was designed by Prof. Fabrice Denis, a CNRS Associate Researcher and pioneering designer of medical applications, and developed with emergency physicians and infectious disease specialists from several university hospitals including the Paris Public Hospital Network (AP-HP) and expert epidemiologists from the Institut Pasteur. It is currently France’s most frequently used self-triage tool (used 13 million times since March 15, 2020) and is the subject of a scientific publication in the Journal of Medical Internet Research.
The application directs users with typical COVID-19 symptoms to their physician, the emergency medical services, or a self-monitoring tool, depending on symptoms and risk factors. It is the first application to be approved by the French Ministry of Health in the fight against the epidemic and continues to be widely used (30,000 visits per day). Moreover, its algorithms are now used in the new "mesconseilscovid" government application.
Informing, analyzing and referring people to the right services. The maladiecoronavirus.fr tools are made available to all citizens, free of charge, while respecting their privacy.
A study published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research examined the impact of use of the application during the first wave in March on the number of calls to the French medical emergency number (15) leading to hospitalization. Dispatch centers from six French departments (Bas-Rhin, Paris, Hauts-de-Seine, Seine-Saint-Denis, Val-de-Marne) were consulted. The study revealed an eightfold reduction in the number of unnecessary calls to the French medical emergency number following deployment of the maladiecoronavirus.fr application:
- Prior to deployment, 105 calls (per hospitalization) were made to the medical emergency number;
- After deployment, 14 calls (per hospitalization) were made to the medical emergency number.
This result is partly due to non-severe patients being directed to their general practitioner or remote consultations instead of making emergency calls that would have been unnecessary due to non-severe symptoms. The tool helped prevent overwhelming call volumes to emergency call centers, enabling them to continue running and optimally manage non-COVID emergencies (heart attacks, strokes, etc.).
The application was developed by Kelindi with the analyses of Adobis Group (big data) and support from Docaposte and the Digital Alliance against COVID [page in French] (notably including Banque Postale, Allianz, Vyv, AG2R, Groupama, Malakoff Humanis, Astra Zeneca, and Johnson & Johnson).
Moreover, the "United against the virus" alliance [page in French] (whose three sponsors are the Fondation de France, Institut Pasteur and AP-HP) financed the COVID-TELE project, whose working group created the self-triage algorithm used in maladiecoronavirus.fr.
Source
Implementation of a Self-Triage Web Application for Suspected COVID-19 and Its Impact on Emergency Call Centers: Observational Study, Journal of Medical Internet Research, 23 novembre 2020. 2020;22(11):e22924
Simon Galmiche, Eve Rahbe, Arnaud Fontanet, Aurélien Dinh, François Bénézit, François-Xavier Lescure, Fabrice Denis
This study is part of the priority scientific area Emerging infectious diseases of the Institut Pasteur's strategic plan for 2019-2023.
