Physician Empathy as a Driver of Hand Surgery Patient Satisfaction

Menendez, Mariano E.; Chen, Neal C.; Mudgal, Chaitanya S.; Jupiter, Jesse B.; Ring, David

doi:10.1016/j.jhsa.2015.06.105

Cited by 139 publications

(117 citation statements)

References 40 publications

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“…Furthermore, while increased question-asking is associated with moreeffective patient engagement, its relation to patient satisfaction remains unclear and the subject of further research. The growing realization that patient satisfaction with the hand surgeon is determined primarily by physician empathy rather than to visit duration [23,31] might indirectly indicate that the number of questions asked during the encounter plays a limited role in patient satisfaction. Finally, because of the limited number of surgeons in our study, we were unable to examine physician characteristics influencing patient question-asking behavior.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Patients With Limited Health Literacy Ask Fewer Questions During Office Visits With Hand Surgeons

Menendez

Hoorn

Mackert

et al. 2017

Clinical Orthopaedics &Amp; Related Research

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110

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Background In the midst of rapid expansion of medical knowledge and decision-support tools intended to benefit diverse patients, patients with limited health literacy (the ability to obtain, process, and understand information and services to make health decisions) will benefit from asking questions and engaging actively in their own care. But little is known regarding the relationship between health literacy and question-asking behavior during outpatient office visits. Questions/purposes (1) Do patients with lower levels of health literacy ask fewer questions in general, and as stratified by types of questions? (2) What other patient characteristics are associated with the number of questions asked? (3) How often do surgeons prompt patients to ask questions during an office visit? Methods We audio-recorded office visits of 84 patients visiting one of three orthopaedic hand surgeons for the first time. Patient questions were counted and coded using an adaptation of the Roter Interaction Analysis System in 11 categories: (1) therapeutic regimen; (2) medical condition; (3) lifestyle; (4) requests for services or medications; (5) psychosocial/feelings; (6) nonmedical/procedural; (7) asks for understanding; (8) asks for reassurance; (9) paraphrase/ checks for understanding; (10) bid for repetition; and (11) personal remarks/social conversation. Directly after the visit, patients completed the Newest Vital Sign (NVS) health literacy test, a sociodemographic survey (including age, sex, race, work status, marital status, insurance status), and three Patient-Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System-based questionnaires: Upper-Extremity Function, Pain Interference, and Depression. The NVS scores were divided into limited (0-3) and adequate (4-6) health literacy as done by the tool's creators. We also assessed whether the surgeons prompted patients to ask questions during the encounter. Results Patients with limited health literacy asked fewer questions than patients with adequate health literacy (5 ± 4 versus 9 ± 7; mean difference, À4; 95% CI, À7 to À1; p = 0.002). More specifically, patients with limited health literacy asked fewer questions regarding medical-care issues such as their therapeutic regimen (1 ± 2 versus 3 ± 4; Each author certifies that he or she, or a member of his or her immediate family, has no funding or commercial associations (eg, consultancies, stock ownership, equity interest, patent/licensing arrangements, etc) that might pose a conflict of interest in connection with the submitted article. All ICMJE Conflict of Interest Forms for authors and Clinical Orthopaedics and Related Research 1 editors and board members are on file with the publication and can be viewed on request. Each author certifies that his or her institution approved the human protocol for this investigation, that all investigations were conducted in conformity with ethical principles of research, and that informed consent for participation in the study was obtained. This work was performed at

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Patients With Limited Health Literacy Ask Fewer Questions During Office Visits With Hand Surgeons

Menendez

Hoorn

Mackert

et al. 2017

Clinical Orthopaedics &Amp; Related Research

Self Cite

110

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…They also completed the Consultation and Relational Empathy Measure along with other sociodemographic surveys and three Patient Reported Outcome Measurement Information System (PROMIS) based questionnaires. After controlling for confounding effects, patient-rated physician empathy correlated strongly with the degree of overall satisfaction, and alone accounted for 65% of the variation in satisfaction scores [22].…”

Section: Improving Patient Satisfaction Scoresmentioning

confidence: 97%

Patient satisfaction in musculoskeletal medicine

Smith

Choma

2017

Curr Rev Musculoskelet Med

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Purpose of review This is a literature review of the measurement of patient satisfaction in musculoskeletal medicine. Its purpose is to better understand the motivation for such measurements, the potential confounders, and the potential physician behaviors that may modulate such measures. Recent findings There have been studies documenting that physician conveyance of empathy, the extent to which patients' expectations for pain control and timeliness of care are met, as well as patient demographics and health status all affect the current measures of patient satisfaction. Summary In the mission to affect patient-centered care are met, musculoskeletal providers will be measured by their patients' satisfaction. There is much yet to be understood regarding patients' expectations of care; the science behind case-mix adjustment in this sphere is in its infancy, but there are some compelling reasons for musculoskeletal providers to attempt to optimize their patients' satisfaction.

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“…While those symptoms can confound the use of otherwise valid patient-reported outcomes tools, they render the measurement of satisfaction with treatment outcomes all but impossible. Anxiety and depression appear to be major and independent drivers of dissatisfaction with surgical results [4], as are differences in provider empathy [13], the latter accounting for such a large proportion of the satisfaction they measured that the very construct of satisfaction appeared in one study to be little different from a patient's feeling that the doctor cared about him or her as a person.…”

mentioning

confidence: 97%