Due to COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 many patients, including patients with celiac disease, faced difficulties in accessing health care professionals.

Children’s Hospital Zagreb in cooperation with CeliVita – Living with celiac disease conducted an on-line survey for Croatian patients with celiac disease inquiring about their experiences in accessing gastroenterology office for regular check-ups during the COVID-19 pandemic.

CeliVita distributed the questionnaire to its members and to the members of other patient organizations and 23% of them responded (60% of responders were patients themselves and 40% responded as parents having a child with celiac disease). For every fifth responder regular appointment was cancelled during the last year. However, more than 50% did visit the gastroenterologist in the office and 14% performed the check-up by e-mail or by telephone call. In future, after the pandemic, nearly 60% of those who responded the survey would like to visit the doctor in the office, 35% would like to combine telemedicine options with “live” visits at the office and only 5% would like to perform regular check-ups only using telemedicine options.