Here is a very interesting essay in the Arkansas Business Journal, which ties our research on physician patient conversations into a broader message about the importance of good communication in business. Glad to see our work is having an impact.
Considering all of the technical advances and new complexities in marketing today (such as social, digital and automation), I see the major opportunity for most organizations to be a decidedly analog one. Customer conversations — those interactions in real time, generally face to face — are ripe for improving engagement, service levels, loyalty and growth. A remarkable new study of the conversations between doctors and patients also shows that more proactive face-to-face interactions can even lower costs.
The study comes from Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, the Duke University School of Medicine and several other institutions. The research team studied actual recorded dialogue from 1,755 outpatient visits that occurred between 2010 and 2014. The patients were dealing with breast cancer, depression or rheumatoid arthritis — all conditions with potentially high out-of-pocket costs. The conversations involved 56 oncologists, 36 psychiatrists and 26 rheumatologists.
The researchers wanted to learn how often cost came up in the conversation, who brought it up and what the results were. Among the findings:
- Cost was part of the doctor-patient conversation 30 percent of the time. This was an increase from studies conducted several years before.
- Doctors were just as likely to bring up the topic of cost as their patients were.
- The cost component of the conversation usually lasted one minute or less.
- In nearly half of those times when cost was discussed, either the doctor or the patient came up with a simple strategy to lower costs.
The most typical areas for cost savings included switching pharmacies, using co-pay assistance or drug coupons, switching to lower-cost tests and using free samples of new medications. The patients’ overall care plans were usually not affected.
Duke Professor Peter Ubel said, “A lot of doctors are becoming much more aware of the financial stress patients face … they are being proactive, throwing around ideas that can help patients get more affordable care.”
This is a promising trend.
To read the rest of this article, please visit the Arkansas Business Journal.