Why should I survey patients’ satisfaction?

How does DrScore compare to other patient satisfaction surveys?

How do I tell patients about the survey?

What does the DrScore survey include?

How do I get the reports and what does the DrScore patient satisfaction report include?

How do I use the information?

Why does DrScore make the overall scores public?

What happens with the open comments that patients enter into the survey?

What about disgruntled patients who try to make a doctor look bad?

Are there advertisements on the DrScore website?

What if my practice information on your Web site is not up to date. Can I correct it?




Why should I survey patients’ satisfaction?

While medical care is, ultimately about helping people, it is also a service industry and the best medical practices, like other great companies, are committed to service excellence. Successful companies know that the best way to promote excellence is through acting on feedback from customers.

By conducting patient satisfaction surveys, you give your patients the clear message that you care about the service you offer them and you value their opinions. This message is valuable, even if there aren’t any problems with your practice. When there are issues that could be improved, getting feedback from patients lets you identify and correct those issues before they become acute problems.

There is a growing movement toward requiring health care providers to document the quality of the care they offer. Too often, such an effort emphasizes the economics of health care, not quality. And that’s where DrScore is most relevant. We give you an easy, effective way to document and understand the quality of the care you provide.



How does DrScore compare to other patient satisfaction surveys?

Conducting patient satisfaction surveys in the office can be a major hassle for your staff, interfering with their normal flow of activity. Surveys conducted in the office can’t assure patients their anonymity. Paper-based surveys are also costly, and require time and effort to input data. Some survey services contact patients by mail or phone; these are even more costly.

The DrScore survey offers many advantages to you and your patients. First, the survey removes all the hassles of surveying patients in your office. Second, it assures patients their anonymity. Third, by using an adaptive survey design, the DrScore survey collects detailed patient satisfaction information, while minimizing survey burden. Fourth, unlike do-it-yourself surveys, DrScore gives you the data to compare your practice to other medical practices. Finally, the DrScore survey is one of the least costly ways of doing patient satisfaction surveys, allowing you to survey as many patients as you want for far less than other survey services.



How do I tell patients about the survey?

DrScore will provide you handout cards that you or your office staff can give to patients. These cards say, “We care about you and the medical care we provide you. Please take a minute to help us improve our service by completing an online patient satisfaction survey at www.DrScore.com.” Or, you can add this line to your standard return appointment card. We will also provide you a sign with this message to place at the check out window or other locations in your office. You don’t need to do anything else except to review the reports that will be sent to you by e-mail.



What does the DrScore survey include?

The best way to know what’s in the DrScore survey is for you to visit www.DrScore.com and complete a survey on your own doctor. You’ll quickly see how quick, easy and comprehensive our survey is. The survey is completely anonymous. It includes a base question about overall patient satisfaction, then an open comment field for patients to say whatever they want, good or bad, about the practice. It then includes standard patient satisfaction items so that you can get data to compare to other benchmarks. It also includes a final section that asks patients if there are any areas for improvements. If the patient identifies any specific area, more detailed questions are asked about that area. These additional questions are based on years of patient satisfaction survey experience that have identified common areas in which medical practices can improve.



How do I get the reports and what does the DrScore patient satisfaction report include?

DrScore patient satisfaction survey reports are sent to the practice once a month (or once a quarter, depending on volume of patients surveyed). The reports include mean scores for the physician, the office practice and the staff, each with comparison to benchmark data on US physicians and physicians in your specialty. Histograms and summary data show the distribution of scores for each of the major areas queried by the survey. Patients’ open comments are listed. The survey points out targets for potential improvement—areas where the practice scores significantly lower than the mean for all other doctors. Most importantly, the DrScore Report describes in detail potential problem areas pointed out by patients.



How do I use the information?

Nearly all doctors will find the DrScore Reports a great way to motivate themselves and their patients. Doctors in the U.S. do a terrific job, and that is well recognized by most patients. Posting the DrScore reports in the staff’s common area allows the doctor and staff the opportunity to see on a regular basis the exceptional work they are doing. Moreover, by having this quantitative data, the practice can set goals for even higher levels of excellence and reward their staff when these levels are achieved. Some doctors may want to have the information on hand when negotiating payment rates with insurers.



Why does DrScore make the overall scores public?

Making physicians’ overall scores public is an important feature of the DrScore survey. By giving patients access to these scores, patients realize the importance of completing the surveys. Being able to see and compare scores gives patients a strong incentive to visit the site and participate in the survey service. All too often, the only time the press covers doctors is when some rare error in judgment was made. Making doctors scores public will show what a good job doctors are doing for their patients, day in and day out.



What happens with the open comments that patients enter into the survey?

It is essential to give patients the opportunity to make any comments they want. We’ve reviewed hundred of comments that have come in, and typically they are glowing endorsements of doctors. Often they point to specific issues of importance, both positive and negative. Occasionally, they are negative, but these comments are also helpful. DrScore DOES NOT make any of the open comments public, but does provide the comments verbatim to doctors who register for the DrScore patient satisfaction reporting service as part of the DrScore Report.



What about disgruntled patients who try to make a doctor look bad?

By giving disgruntled patients an opportunity to give doctors feedback, DrScore provides these patients a constructive outlet for criticism. Patient satisfaction measurement also helps practices identify and correct areas that might frustrate patients to begin with, reducing the number of disgruntled patients. By doing patient satisfaction surveys and attending to the results, DrScore expects patient, staff and physician satisfaction to increase and malpractice risks to decrease.

Still, there will always be some patients who will be dissatisfied, no matter how good the practice is. DrScore discourages people from putting in multiple scores. DrScore feels that patient anonymity is a critical feature, so completely eliminating the possibility of a patient putting in multiple scores is not possible. Nevertheless, our database has numerous safeguards built in and our staff regularly scan ratings to check for anomalies and possible multi-ratings.



Are there advertisements on the DrScore website?

DrScore is committed to improving patients’ health and well being. When a patient visits the site to find or rate a doctor, DrScore provides targeted information to educate the patient. We believe that patient advocacy groups and physician organizations have valuable information that helps patients be better patients. Links to patient advocacy groups, physician specialty organizations and the National Library of Medicine website are provided. These links are targeted to each visitor to the site, based on the specialty of the physician they are seeking or rating. DrScore does not charge patient advocacy groups or physician specialty organizations to provide this information. In addition, all information placed on the site is carefully screened to assure it is beneficial for patients.



What if my practice information on your Web site is not up to date. Can I correct it?

Yes. You can provide up to date information when you sign up for the DrScore service. Even if you aren’t signing up for the service, we’d like to have updated information for you on the site. Simply send the correct information to us at physicianservices@DrScore.com.