A study conducted by the US-based Beryl Institute looked at consumer attitudes to their experiences with physicians and medical practices.
Respondents were asked to voice opinions on the issues:
- To what extent patient experience matters to healthcare consumers?
- How they define Patient Experience?
- What their priorities are when visiting a practice?
- What impact the experience has on their choice and recommendation of practitioners?
The survey received data from 2,000 randomly selected healthcare consumers, across five countries with English as the primary language. By design, there was a supported range of ages in the survey, with the largest number of respondents coming from the 35-64 age group, while the gender identification was virtually equal.
Findings from the study strongly support the proposition that patient experience has become a high priority among consumers over the last decade and recognition of this will be a major driver for providers in the future.
Some of the key outtakes from the study
How significant is the patient experience to your choice of provider? 89% of respondents rated it ‘Very Important’ or ‘Extremely Important’.
The top three ranked issues for consumers were:
- Being listened to carefully by the practitioner, when discussing their condition, needs and expectations.
- Having the practitioner communicate treatment options and recommendations and realistic outcomes clearly.
- Being treated with courtesy and respect across every patient/ practice interaction.
Different generations have diverging attitudes in relation to how and where they source information and recommendations.
- Baby Boomers rated ‘Patient Experience’ slightly less important overall and only 20% considered ‘Online Ratings’ signifi cant.
- Millennials consider a ‘Patient Experience’ as higher priority and 38% took significant notice of information from ‘Online Rating’ sites.
There are obvious tangible implications of both ‘positive’ and ‘negative’ patient experiences that impact on consumer decisions regarding: choice of provider; customer loyalty; and the propensity to relay their personal experience to other people.
Insight Patient Satisfaction Solutions assists prestigious medical practices to engage with their customers by means of bespoke, web-enabled ‘patient experience’ feedback programs. AMP
The Overall Message
This is not just about being satisfied, but rather consumers of healthcare services have a raised level of expectations. They are looking for an ‘experience’ that treats them in certain ways and acknowledges them as people throughout the entire process.
