1. Patient Satisfaction Connected to Physician Gender
Alissa Moreland | Dr. Mary Campbell | amorel@tamu.edu | Texas A&M University
Literature Review
• Patients are more likely to be satisfied leaving a
medical history interaction if their physician’s
gender is the same as their own gender.
Hypothesis
• Existing literature demonstrates that interactions involving concordant
gender dyads are often higher in communication quality than
interactions that do not involve concordant gender dyads (Hall 1984).
• Specifically, studies have found that female patient-physician dyads
often exhibit preferable communication quality (Roter 1991).
• In one study, female physicians included more positive talk, partnership
building, question asking, and information giving related to both
biomedical and psychosocial topics than their male physician
counterparts (Roter 1991).
Project Overview
• I examined gender differences in medical history interactions
between patients and physicians to find if patients are more likely
to be satisfied if their physician’s gender is the same as their own.
• Hypothesis 1: The influence of gender on patient-physician
communication is significant.
• Hypothesis 2: Concordant gender dyads produce high quality
medical interactions.
• Hypothesis 3: Of the categories of gender dyads, female patients
paired with female physicians are the most satisfied with their
medical interaction.
Variables/Research
Data Results
Conclusion
• This study illustrates some differences between patient gender
and satisfaction levels based on the gender of the paired
physician after a medical history interaction.
• This study cannot determine the factors behind these differences
in satisfaction levels based on gender.
• The results do indicate that female patients rated their
physicians the most positive for all the indicators of satisfaction.
• If concordant gender dyads produce high quality medical
interactions and higher patient satisfaction levels, then a patient
may be more likely to listen to their physician’s medical advice
and/or further discuss medical concerns if their physician’s
gender is the same as their own gender.
• The results show that concordant gender patient-physician
dyads produce higher patient satisfaction levels compared to the
non-concordant dyad categories. This may be due to a real or
perceived cohesiveness of communication styles within
concordant gender dyads.
References
• Hall, Judith. 1984. Nonverbal Sex Differences: Communication Accuracy and
Expressive Style. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
• Roter, Debra, Lipkin, Mack, and Korsgaard, Audrey. 1991. “Sex Differences in
Patients’ and Physicians’ Communication during Primary Care Medical Visits”.
Medical Care 29(11):1083-1093.
• After analyzing the survey results, I found that female patients paired
with female physicians were more comfortable, calm, and positive
within the medical history interaction.
• Male patients rated themselves high for comfort, calmness, and
positivity after interacting with male physicians.
• Female patients paired with female physicians were the most satisfied
gender dyad category.
• Overall, patients are more likely to be satisfied with a medical history
interaction if paired with a physician the same gender as their own.
• I analyzed survey data collected from the University of Iowa
Carver College of Medicine regarding interactions between
randomly assigned medical students and actor patients for the
purpose of observing physician-patient perceptions while
physicians asked for a medical history from patients.
• The surveys included a total of 570 medical history interactions
from the participating patients and the physicians.
• The respondents self reported information about their physician-
patient interactions regarding levels of comfort, anxiety, calmness,
negative feelings, and listening.
• The survey employed a Likert Scale from one to seven.
Additionally, the one represents a low level, and the seven
represents a high level.