Using Patient Experience Surveys to Identify Potential Diagnostic Safety Breakdowns: A Mixed Methods Study

One in 20 outpatients in the United States experiences a diagnostic error each year, but there are no validated methods for collecting feedback from patients on diagnostic safety. We examined patient experience surveys to determine whether patients' free text comments indicated diagnostic breakdowns. Our objective was to evaluate associations between patient-perceived diagnostic breakdowns reported in free text comments and patients' responses to structured survey questions.

We conducted an exploratory mixed methods study using data from patient experience surveys collected from adult ambulatory care patients March 2020 to June 2020 in a large U.S. health system. Data analysis included content analysis of qualitative data and statistical analysis of quantitative data.

In 2525 surveys with negative comments, 619 patients (24.5%) identified diagnostic breakdowns, including issues with accuracy (n = 282, 46%), timeliness (n = 243, 39%), or communication (n = 290, 47%); some patients (n = 181) reported breakdowns in multiple categories. Patients who gave a low average score (50 or less on a 100-point scale) on provider questions were almost seven times more likely to perceive a diagnostic breakdown than patients who scored their provider higher. Similarly, patients who gave a low average score on practice-related questions were twice as likely to perceive a diagnostic breakdown.

Patient feedback in routinely collected patient experience surveys is a valuable and actionable information source on diagnostic breakdowns in the ambulatory setting. The more easily monitored structured survey data provide a screening method to identify encounters that may have included a patient-perceived diagnostic breakdown and therefore require further examination.