Patient Care Improves When Doctors Know Each Other

Importantly, they examined referrals that were distributed to specialists by a scheduling system rather than referrals where PCPs requested specific specialists. In this way, they were able to isolate the causal effect that might see if patients were randomized to specialists.

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Interactions between PCPs and specialists are a bedrock of medicine, and specialty referrals are how a lot of downstream patient care gets shaped.

Given the communication and collaboration inherent in caring for referred patients, researchers were wondering whether prior PCP-specialist relationships influence that care, especially as experienced by patients.

Not only are patient experiences an important dimension of quality of care, but we thought they may also be responsive to physician efforts to demonstrate their professionalism given the medical profession’s emphasis on patient-centered care.

They found that patients referred to specialists by co-trainees rated their specialists higher on almost all dimensions we examined.

This includes not only interpersonal communication — such as friendliness, quality of explanations, and demonstrated concern — but also involvement in shared decision-making, use of understandable language, and amount of time spent.

In addition to higher patient ratings, co-training elicited changes in specialists’ medication-prescribing behavior, which suggests an impact beyond patient perception.

The existence of a strong peer relationship may remind specialists of commonly valued precepts of professionalism or otherwise motivate them to change care in ways that have a positive impact on patients. In the future, researchers may find more friendly ways of patient care.

Source: Eurekalert