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Patient-physician fit: an exploratory study of a multidimensional instrument
Alan Schwartz1, Memoona Hasnain, Arnold R Eiser
1Department of Medical Education, 808 S. Wood Street, 986 CME, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL 60612, USA. alansz@uic.edu
Summary
Patient and physician preferences for medical care behaviors often differ, impacting patient satisfaction. Aligning these preferences, especially regarding decision-making and personal beliefs, enhances patient satisfaction and guides physician-patient relationships.
Area of Science:
- Medical Sociology
- Health Services Research
- Patient-Physician Communication
Background:
- Patients struggle to select physicians due to limited understanding of physician behaviors aligning with personal preferences.
- Effective patient-physician relationships are crucial for healthcare outcomes and patient satisfaction.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop and validate scales measuring patient and physician preferences for specific physician behaviors.
- To investigate the association between patient-physician behavioral preference alignment and patient satisfaction.
Main Methods:
- Cross-sectional surveys administered to patients and healthcare providers in ambulatory clinics.
- Development of instruments to assess six key physician behavior preferences, including consideration of nonmedical aspects, herbal medicine, decision-making, information provision, religious beliefs, and problem perception.
- Patients reported their preferred physician behaviors, physicians reported their preferred behaviors, and patients rated their satisfaction with their current physician.
Main Results:
- Patients generally preferred physicians to provide more information and less consideration of nonmedical aspects and religious beliefs compared to physicians.
- Significant variance in patient satisfaction was explained by preference differences (19-25% across family and internal medicine).
- Patient satisfaction correlated with alignment in physician decision-making preferences (internal medicine) and with alignment in information provision and consideration of religion (family medicine).
Conclusions:
- Discrepancies exist between patient and physician preferences for physician behaviors.
- A strong correlation exists between the degree of patient-physician preference alignment and increased patient satisfaction.
- Healthcare providers should be mindful of patient preferences regarding the consideration of religion and other nonmedical life aspects.
- Health plans could facilitate patient choice by offering tools that assess physician-physician fit.
