Despite numerous initiatives to encourage people to use healthcare price and quality information, most Americans still rely on word-of-mouth and physician recommendations to choose health providers, according to a national study by the Center for Studying Health System Change (HSC), funded by the California HealthCare Foundation.
While sponsors of healthcare price and quality transparency initiatives often identify all consumers as their target audiences, the true audiences for these programs are much more limited, the study found. In 2007, only 11 percent of American adults looked for a new primary care physician, 28 percent needed a new specialist physician, and 16 percent underwent a medical procedure at a new facility, according to findings from HSC's 2007 Health Tracking Household Survey, a nationally representative survey containing information on 13,500 adults. The survey had a 43 percent response rate.
When selecting new primary care physicians, half of all consumers relied on word-of-mouth recommendations from friends and relatives, but many also used doctor recommendations (38%) and health plan information (35%). Nearly two in five used multiple information sources when choosing a primary care physician, but when choosing specialists and facilities for medical procedures, most consumers relied exclusively on physician referrals, according to the study.
Read the research brief.
