New survey finds more doctors bringing Internet into their practices

But according to “Internet Use by Medical Groups”, a recent survey conducted for the Health Technology Center (HealthTech) by Harris Interactive in cooperation with PricewaterhouseCoopers

By Editor on Mar 30, 2001

But according to Internet Use by Medical Groups, a recent survey conducted for the Health Technology Center (HealthTech) by Harris Interactive in cooperation with PricewaterhouseCoopers and the Institute for the Future (IFTF), physicians are welcoming an increased role for the Internet in their practices.

Physicians are actively seeking to integrate computers and the Internet into their practices and do not appear to need further convincing that technology will play an increasingly significant role, said HealthTech CEO Molly Joel Coye.

In fact, 85% of the survey participants indicated they currently use at least one Internet-enabled application. While the most popular activities are reviewing general medical research and news online (71%) and accessing guidelines and protocols (50%), many respondents indicated they are using a host of other Internet-enabled applications.

Online claims processing services were used by 35% of survey participants and four 34% indicated they use Internet sources for information about prescription medications. Other applications considered by respondents to be of the greatest use included diagnostic reporting (34%), medical office products purchasing (29%), e-mail communication with patients (29%) and electronic medical records (19%).

The survey was conducted among 215 physician leaders (CEOs or Medical Directors of medical groups) and office-based practicing physicians in medium and large practice organizations. Physicians are increasingly moving into medical groups that have the organizational capacity to assess and invest in new technologies, said Lee Akay, Managing Partner for the PricewaterhouseCoopers MCS Healthcare Practice and co-sponsor of the survey. By focusing on physicians practicing in a group setting, this study more accurately benchmarks trends in medical practice. These organized physician practices are moving the industry as a whole toward the tipping point's in adopting new technology.

However, in spite of the increased impact the Internet is having on their practices, survey participants cited several barriers to universal implementation of Internet-enabled services. These included a lack of data and communication standards and incompatibility of current health information applications.

Physicians are stymied by incompatible systems that cannot talk's to each other, and most of all by the absence of industry standards that would allow vendors to develop applications that link data from disparate systems, said Akay. The absence of standardized and compatible services across the industry makes it risky for individual practices to move to the next level of Internet-enabled efficiencies and quality improvement.

Physician leaders overwhelming agreed (93%) that lack of system compatibility across healthcare organizations is the most critical barrier to realization of the full potential of Internet-enabled systems in medicine. In contrast, concerns about confidentiality and privacy ranked sixth, with about half of respondents rating privacy as only a minor concern.

Ninety-three percent (93%) of the physicians surveyed cited industry-wide agreement on standards as an effective way to drive change, and 84% said it was the preferred way to bring about the universal use of the Internet among physicians. When asked who might step in to fulfill the needed integration and standard-setting, more than two thirds of the participants believed the most effective action would be steps by the Health Care Financing Administration (HCFA) (72%) or major health plans (68%) to require participating physicians to use the Internet for claims processing.

Participants also indicated a lack of real world applications designed to fit existing workflow patterns in clinical settings, a lack of capital and individual resistance to change as additional factors slowing the uptake of technology.

In spite of adoption barriers, more than 80% of those surveyed agreed Internet technologies are essential or important advantages for reducing administrative costs, speeding payments for care and improving the quality of care. In addition, there was widespread agreement that computers have already had a positive impact on the practice of medicine.

This study should serve as a wake-up call for all physicians who are not yet prepared to take advantage of Internet-enabled clinical and administrative services, said Wendy Everett, Director of IFTF's healthcare programs and Chair of HealthTech's board. These results show that Internet-enabled medical practice is rapidly approaching critical mass and medical providers who don'st have these capabilities will soon be at a real disadvantage.

To learn more about the survey, visit HealthTech's Web site at healthtechcenter.org.