RAND study: Quality of patient care is the primary driver of physician satisfaction

Tuesday, November 05, 2013 09:00 AM

A study released in October by the RAND Corporation has found that being able to provide high-quality care to their patients is the primary reason for job satisfaction among physicians, while obstacles to doing so are a key source of stress.

Sponsored by the American Medical Association and supported by several state societies around the country—including the Colorado Medical Society—the study is designed to identify the factors that influence physicians’ professional satisfaction, an issue of increasing importance as health reform and other forces are altering contemporary delivery and payment models. It is the first step in the AMA’s strategic initiative to enhance practice sustainability and professional satisfaction through effective care delivery and payment models.

Findings suggest that monitoring the factors contributing to physician dissatisfaction offers tangible early warning signs of deeper quality problems developing in the health care system.

“Overcoming modern medicine’s greatest obstacles to first-rate medical care can simultaneously enhance the quality of care and improve professional satisfaction among physicians,” AMA President Ardis Dee Hoven, MD, said in a news release. “The AMA is committed to leading a national dialog regarding the major factors driving many physicians to feel increasingly disconnected from what really matters—their patients.”

Among the most common contributors to professional dissatisfaction were the challenges posed by today’s cumbersome electronic health records (EHR) systems. The physicians surveyed for the study expressed concern that current technology interferes with face-to-face discussions with patients, requires physicians to spend too much time on clerical work and degrades the accuracy of medical records by encouraging template-generated notes.

Other drivers of dissatisfaction included excessive productivity quotas and limitations on the time spent with each patient, as well as the cumulative burden of rules and regulations that has drained time and resources away from patient care.

Sources of satisfaction included practice environments that allowed more autonomy in structuring clinical activities and more control over the pace and content of patient care. Doctors also were more likely to report satisfaction if they were in physician-owned practices or partnerships rather than practices owned by hospitals or corporations.

Click here to access the study.