Patient Satisfaction (April 15, 2014)
I recently read a fascinating article on “patient satisfaction”. This is a relatively new tool used by the business end of modern medicine to improve their bottom line that does not necessarily lead to improvements in people's health. For example, patients with respiratory infections who receive a prescription for antibiotics are more satisfied – although often that infection is viral and the use of the antibiotic will actually prolong their illness. One hospital found that patients who left the hospital with a prescription for a powerful painkiller were more satisfied – so now everyone who leaves that hospital gets one. These patient surveys have found that being told to quit smoking or lose weight decreases patient satisfaction with their visit.
So “patient satisfaction” has become a measurement of business "success" with the potential to greatly compromise the quality of medical care. Physicians who work in and for bureaucracies are subject to regular job evaluations, and how satisfied their patients are (as measured by post-visit telephone surveys, just like the ones you can take after you talk to your credit card company) have become a big part of this. Those doctors who make their patients uncomfortable by telling them things that they may not like to hear suffer from poorer evaluations than those who do not, regardless of the quality of their advice.
Interestingly, one study on this subject found that the patients who were the most pleased with their care were overall more ill and had a higher death rate than those who were less pleased with their care. Now THAT is a statistic to look at! It could mean many things, of course, but one thing it almost certainly means is that what we like is not necessarily what is good for us. (Which is one of the first lessons of adulthood. But that’s another subject.) I hardly know what to say further about this, except that we do know that satisfaction correlates very strongly with expectation -- if you get what you expect, you are more satisfied. So my advice is that in your own case, think hard about what you really want from your doctors, and also try to make a point of measuring your own satisfaction with your care mainly by whether or not your doctor's advice and treatment is improving your health .
--dr. diane holmes
Copyright © 2014
I recently read a fascinating article on “patient satisfaction”. This is a relatively new tool used by the business end of modern medicine to improve their bottom line that does not necessarily lead to improvements in people's health. For example, patients with respiratory infections who receive a prescription for antibiotics are more satisfied – although often that infection is viral and the use of the antibiotic will actually prolong their illness. One hospital found that patients who left the hospital with a prescription for a powerful painkiller were more satisfied – so now everyone who leaves that hospital gets one. These patient surveys have found that being told to quit smoking or lose weight decreases patient satisfaction with their visit.
So “patient satisfaction” has become a measurement of business "success" with the potential to greatly compromise the quality of medical care. Physicians who work in and for bureaucracies are subject to regular job evaluations, and how satisfied their patients are (as measured by post-visit telephone surveys, just like the ones you can take after you talk to your credit card company) have become a big part of this. Those doctors who make their patients uncomfortable by telling them things that they may not like to hear suffer from poorer evaluations than those who do not, regardless of the quality of their advice.
Interestingly, one study on this subject found that the patients who were the most pleased with their care were overall more ill and had a higher death rate than those who were less pleased with their care. Now THAT is a statistic to look at! It could mean many things, of course, but one thing it almost certainly means is that what we like is not necessarily what is good for us. (Which is one of the first lessons of adulthood. But that’s another subject.) I hardly know what to say further about this, except that we do know that satisfaction correlates very strongly with expectation -- if you get what you expect, you are more satisfied. So my advice is that in your own case, think hard about what you really want from your doctors, and also try to make a point of measuring your own satisfaction with your care mainly by whether or not your doctor's advice and treatment is improving your health .
--dr. diane holmes
Copyright © 2014