Most Americans are still setting up doctor appointments and getting test results via phone calls, and they seem to be happy with it. A new survey from Salesforce shows that most Americans are satisfied with the care they receive from their physicians, despite fairly limited adoption of online tools to communicate with their doctors.
Less than 10 percent of those surveyed said they use the web, email or text to set up appointments, compared to 76 percent that still do so over the phone and 25 percent that schedule their appointments in person.
Most patients don’t have any kind of personal health record. Asked how they keep track of their health data, 62 percent said they rely on their doctor, 36 percent used some kind of electronic record, 28 percent used some kind of physical record, and 9 percent said they didn’t keep track of their health data at all (for many of the questions, respondents were allowed to choose multiple options).
For getting test results, 44 percent got them in person, 35 percent checked in by phone, and 17 percent used the web. Another 15 percent waited for test results to come via snail mail and 12 percent received them by email.
While 92 percent of respondents professed satisfaction with their primary care physician and 86 percent reported being generally satisfied with their care, respondents didn’t love the amount of attention they got from physicians outside the doctor’s office. Forty percent said they receive no ongoing care recommendations from their physician and the lowest area of satisfaction was with education on preventative care (70 percent satisfaction).
To read the official Salesforce article with the full survey information, please click here.