Some of us won’t go to a restaurant or attend a performance without first checking how other people rated the experience. Sometimes other peoples’ perspectives are instructive and useful- and sometimes their ratings seem trivial or silly. The question is: what do we make of the ratings other people give for their physicians? Rapport and relationship with your physician can be a very personal experience. And the outcome you have may have little bearing on what someone else would experience- or would it? It’s a controversial topic, made all the more so as Medicare is considering including patient ratings on its website, Physician Compare, which is intended to help consumers find physicians and other health care providers who accept Medicare. As you can imagine, there are groups in favor of, and opposed to, this inclusion of consumer ratings as part of the quality measurement of clinicians listed on this Medicare website. To find out more, check out this recent Bloomberg article Here. And for more general guidance on how to choose the physician that’s right for you, read this advice from Consumer Reports Here.

Source: https://www.bna.com/doctors-say-no-n730144…