Becker's Hospital Review

81 FINANCE CMO / CARE DELIVERY What matters most to patients about their primary care physician: 10 findings By Alyssa Rege F orty-one percent of patients identified the quality of care they receive as the most important factor in selecting a pri- mary care physician, according to recent re- port by business management and consulting firm McKinsey & Co. McKinsey's annual Consumer Health Insights survey is delivered to a panel of roughly 3,000 individuals to examine their engagement with healthcare delivery. In its 2016 survey, the management firm asked respondents to rank 20 factors in terms of their importance when selecting a PCP. McKinsey noted 2,809 respondents responded to a survey question asking them to determine which five of the 20 factors they considered to be the "most important" when selecting a PCP. Here are the top 10 factors respondents identified: 1. Quality of care you receive — 41 percent 2. Cost you pay (i.e., out-of-pocket costs) — 11 percent 3. Location — 7 percent 4. Continuity of care/consistency of physicians and/or care team — 4 percent 5. Appointment availability — 4 percent 6. Appointment times that meet your needs — 4 percent 7. Quality of physical facility — 4 percent 8. Ease of access — 4 percent 9. Range of services offered — 3 percent 10. Services from clinical staff — 3 percent n Online physician review websites may be offering distorted data By Anuja Vaidya A study, published in the Journal of Medical Internet Research, found data from online third-party physician review websites may be mis- leading for patients. Researchers examined ratings for 212,933 healthcare providers on the Healthgrades' consumer ratings website. These providers represent 29 medical specialties, 15 surgical specialties and six allied health professions in the U.S. Researchers found overall satisfaction ratings tended to skew positively, fall within narrow ranges and had different distributions across specialties. Thus, seemingly high scores may actually be average or low, resulting in patients overestimating the ratings of the physicians they choose. Third-party review websites can help amend the situation by providing median star ratings for each provider and making note of where they rank among peers in their specialty. For the current study, researchers also creat- ed an online tool that used provider rankings to show how they compared to others in their field. "Specialty-specific percentile ranks may help consumers to more meaning- fully assess online physician ratings," study authors concluded. n U of Buffalo medical school reintroduces radiology residency program after 12 years By Alyssa Rege T he Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education approved the University of Buffalo (N.Y.) Jacobs School of Medicine and Bio- medical Sciences' plan to reintroduce a medical residency program in radiology, according to Buffalo Business First. With the council's approval, the medical school will recruit 16 residents into the program over the next four years, beginning with four enrollees in March 2019. The school voluntarily withdrew its radiology residency program in 2006, cit- ing a limited number of radiology faculty members and a regionwide reorga- nization of hospital radiology departments. The medical school initiated plans to reintroduce the program about two years ago, according to the report. The residency program is a collaboration between the University of Buffalo's physician group; the VA Western New York Healthcare System, which main- tains locations in Buffalo and Batavia, N.Y.; Kaleida Health and Erie County Medical Center, both in Buffalo. The program will be led by Jonathan Marshall, DO, chief of service of radiol- ogy and imaging at Erie County Medical Center. n

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