Trusting Sources of Information on Quality of Physician Care

Abstract

Reporting healthcare quality has become an important factor in healthcare delivery. Prior research has shown that patient-consumers do not frequently use information on websites reporting physician quality to guide their choice of physicians. Our aim is to understand the contextual and personal characteristics that influence patient-consumers’ decisions to trust or ignore information sources about healthcare quality. We use data from Finding Quality Doctors: How Americans Evaluate Provider Quality in the US, 2014, to examine factors that explain trust in sources reporting healthcare quality provided by physicians. Using factor analysis, 3 overarching information sources were identified: (1) employers and healthcare providers; (2) user advocacy sources; and (3) insurance companies and government. We use multiple regression analysis to understand the factors that impact trust in these 3 information sources. Our study found that contrary to previous findings, health status was not a significant factor that affects trust in sources reporting care quality data. Also, age was the only factor that significantly correlated with trusting information from all 3 sources. Specifically, younger adults trusted information from all sources compared to older adults. Furthermore, political affiliation, employment status, income, and area of residence correlated with trusting care quality information from either companies and government agencies or family and social network sources. Results suggest that individual and contextual characteristics are significant factors in trusting information sources regardless of health status and these should be taken into consideration by those promoting public reporting of healthcare quality information.

Influence of word of mouth (WOM) in physician selection by the patients in Bangladesh

“…Another study refers to this type of search behavior as “personal view” behavior (Martin, 2020; Snipes et al , 2015). Information coming from the family, friends, peers, relatives are considered to be the most trusted source to a person (Moore et al , 2020; Oguro et al , 2021). People find trusted sources are non-paid and they have no formal linkup with the physicians.…”

“…The expertise of a physician means the diagnosis ability of the physician and it affects the treatment of patients (Mcdonald et al, 2002;Tamblyn et al, 2007). According to the researchers, the level of medical expertise, professionalism and competence of the physician affects the level of trust (Moore et al, 2020;Rosenberg, 2018). The physician is considered to have consistency and experience of both medical appliance and emotional competence (empathy, individual, compassionate and thorough).…”

“…According to the findings of (Dobele and Lindgreen, 2011), personal recommendations were perceived as having greater credibility than paid marketing information or referrals from physicians. The most reliable information comes from informal sources such as friends and relatives (Moore et al, 2020). People rated suggestions from family, friends and coworkers on a comparable scale.…”