Why Healthcare Reviews are important?
- It’s not just restaurants and shops that benefit from online reviews.
- Many hospitals and healthcare providers are involved in medical malpractices to increase the operating profit.
- More and more patients are reading reviews when making decisions about hospitals and healthcare service providers.
- Doctor reviews posted online by patients are one of the most important factors in the overall success of any healthcare practice.
- Platforms such as www.ayurcompare.com are intended to collect reviews of healthcare providers in Kerala.
Some interesting Facts about Reviews:
- Almost three quarters (77 percent) of patients use online reviews as the very first step to finding a new doctor.
- 9 percent of patients say they selected a doctor based on positive reviews, and nearly the same percentage (60.8 percent) say they avoided doctors based on negative reviews.
- 47 percent say they still check a doctor out online, even if they were referred to them by another physician.
- It takes one to six online reviews for 68 percent of patients to form an opinion about a healthcare practice.
- 60 percent of respondents feel it’s “very” or “moderately important” for providers to respond publicly to online reviews.
Tips for Patients to Write Useful Reviews:
- Avoid Exaggerated reviews – Both positive and negative.
- Consider if you want to help others by providing genuine insights?
- If listing pros and cons, bulleted lists can help readers get through the points faster.
- Avoid generalities. If there is an incident or issue you want to share, be specific but concise.
- Do not let your personal feelings demean a doctor’s competency. Suggesting that people should avoid a doctor because you didn’t like him helps no one.
- Avoid using negative labels like “the worst,” “horrid,” and “the rudest” and find other ways to express your feelings.
Defamation
- Finally, remember that there is a fine line between negativity and defamation. In the same way that a hotel can lose customers if someone claims there are bed bugs, doctors can lose patients if there is any suggestion of impropriety of any sort. If a comment is posted has that effect, some doctors may sue.
- While this shouldn’t discourage you from posting, it does suggest that you do so responsibly, fairly, and with the full knowledge that, once you hit the “POST” button.
Best Practices for a Healthy Listing & Great Doctor Reviews
Update your information.
- Always ensure that the information in your listing is up-to-date, accurate, and complete. Incorrect listings give a bad first impression to patients, and it might convince them to look for another provider.
Monitor your online reputation.
- Reviews and reputation management should be a focal point in your healthcare marketing strategy.
- You must be able to understand what patients see when they search for and read about your practice on online review sites and search results. The best way to stay on top of reviews is by checking the listing at a regular frequency.
Respond to reviews.
- On sites where you can, respond to what patients are saying about your practice. This allows you to minimize the impact of a negative review or reinforce the great user experience detailed in a positive review. More importantly, this helps build patient engagement.
- You cannot disclose any protected patient health information in your response. Even if the patient willingly includes their own information in their review, that does not give you permission to respond with information about their health.
