Here are eight findings from Medscape’s 2016 survey, which is based on a similar study Medscape conducted in 2014.
1. While only 13 percent of patients said they were uneasy about using smartphone technology to self-diagnose, 31 percent of physicians felt uncomfortable with the process.
2. 72 percent of patients and 67 percent of physicians felt smartphones should be used to perform blood tests.
3. Eighty-nine percent of patients believe they have the right to access all physician notes. Only six in ten — or 60 percent of — physicians, however, believe patients should have access to all their notes.
4. Patients have become more comfortable with how secure EHRs are. This year, only 31 percent of patients were hesitant to use digital data due to privacy concerns, compared with 42 percent of patients in 2014. Thirty-nine percent of physicians were hesitant to use digital data this year, compared with 40 percent in 2014.
5. Sixty-one percent of patients and 49 percent of physicians believe EHRs improve the patient-physician relationship.
6. Physicians and patients strongly disagree on how efficient EHRs are. Eighty percent of patients said EHRs help physicians and their staff work more efficiently. Only 54 percent of physicians felt the same way.
7. Physicians overestimated how many patients prefer in-person visits. Eighty-one percent of physicians said they believe patients prefer to see them in person, but only 68 percent of patients said they prefer in-person visits.
8. Among physicians, the biggest perceived barriers to telemedicine were malpractice/liability concerns (60 percent), followed by reimbursement concerns (43 percent), technical problems (40 percent) and privacy/security issues (40 percent).
Among patients, the No. 1 perceived barrier was a lack of confidence about whether a telemedicine diagnosis is accurate (64 percent). Other top perceived barriers include a physician not providing telemedicine (51 percent), concerns over insurance coverage (40 percent), privacy/security issues (33 percent) and technical problems connecting via phone or video (31 percent).
Click here to view more results from Medscape’s survey.
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