How Good Is Your Doctor?

I started to evaluate just how good our physician is when we started discussing changing health insurance coverage to reduce costs. I knew I would need to select another physician for a new plan and was evaluating the pros and cons which included who would be my physician.

Gone are the days when doctors and patients know each other and their families over a lifetime. Today’s health care plans bring some patients into a new plan every few years leaving them without the continuity of a longstanding patient-physician relationship.

It’s true that our ability to evaluate our doctors improves when  we have more information and know more  about them. The problem is being a doctor is part science and part art. Nothing it seems is black and white let alone diagnosing and caring for patients. For instance, being more cost efficient isn’t going to insure that your physician is a better diagnostician. Graduating from a prestigious medical school doesn’t insure that patients will be more satisfied with that doctor than someone who graduated from a local medical school.

One of the biggest hurdles is that there is no standard rating system or measure of quality for physicians. What’s more data on treatment outcomes doesn’t take into account the patient’s health and complications before the problem. The category of patient satisfaction may include questions on parking availability and politeness of office staff. Good questions but not substitutes for questions such as Was the diagnosis correct? Was the treatment correct? Did her condition improve?

State medical boards can tell you whether a physician is licensed in that state, is certified in a specialty, and if he or she has been the subject of any disciplinary action. You may also search for liability claims but those are even more complicated depending on each case and the attorneys. Magazine ratings about who is the best doc in town are either outright commercials or a combination of popularity contest and infomercial and the magazine hoping for an ad from the physician.

It’s not hopeless, however. You can find out all sorts of information about doctors if you ask the right questions to the right people.  Here’s what I do:
Ask other physicians and people you know in the health profession who they would go to if they had such and such a problem?
Ask your primary physician if you need a specialist.
Ask family and friends about their doctors.
Arrange for an interview with your new doctor. Does she listen to you?

Sometimes the way a physician is paid in some managed care plans affects quality. Ask your doctor: Are you penalized financially if you send me to a specialist? Are you penalized if I get a second opinion?

If you require a complicated procedure look for the most experienced physician who does that procedure the most often. Beyond that, select someone you trust, that can explain things to you, and that you sense generally cares about you. Those traits always make a good doctor – patient relationship.

Of course I welcome your suggestions about how you evaluate your physicians.

To your success at healthy aging.

Ruthan Brodsky

Tagged with: evaluating doctors

Filed under: Treatment

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