Table 3.
Proportion of Relationships Cited by Respondents with Specific Reasons for Referral, by Specialty (606 relationships cited by 243 respondents)
| Referral relationships cited, by specialty of respondent | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reasons for referral‡ | All relationships (N = 606) | PCP* (N = 274) | Medical specialists* (N = 197) | Surgical specialists* (N = 124) | ||
| % | % | % | p-value† | % | p-value† | |
| Patient experience with physician§ | 67.0 | 60.2 | 72.6 | 0.01 | 71.8 | 0.03 |
| My patients have good experiences with this physician | 53.1 | 51.5 | 54.3 | 0.60 | 54.0 | 0.71 |
| Physician has good patient rapport | 25.1 | 15.7 | 32.0 | <0.001 | 33.9 | <0.001 |
| Physician communication|| | 55.0 | 62.0 | 46.7 | <0.001 | 52.4 | 0.09 |
| Works in my hospital or practice | 30.5 | 32.8 | 23.4 | 0.03 | 36.3 | 0.58 |
| Quality of communication with me | 19.5 | 23.7 | 17.8 | 0.15 | 13.7 | 0.03 |
| Shares my medical record system | 12.5 | 17.9 | 11.2 | 0.06 | 2.4 | <0.001 |
| Physician refers to me | 2.5 | 0.4 | 1.5 | 0.00 | 8.9 | <0.001 |
| Patient access | 27.9 | 32.5 | 25.4 | 0.12 | 21.8 | 0.04 |
| Location convenient for patient | 13.0 | 12.8 | 13.2 | 1.00 | 13.7 | 0.92 |
| Timely availability of appointments | 12.2 | 15.7 | 11.2 | 0.20 | 6.5 | 0.02 |
| Patient request | 3.5 | 5.5 | 2.0 | 0.10 | 0.8 | 0.05 |
| Speaks patient's language | 0.5 | 0.7 | 0.0 | 0.63 | 0.8 | 1.00 |
| Other | 11.4 | 8.8 | 17.8 | 0.01 | 8.1 | 0.97 |
*Sample sizes in these columns indicate the number of relationships cited by respondents in each category, not the number of respondents. Respondents could cite more than one relationship and provide differing reasons for those referral relationships
†p-values reported are for comparisons with proportions in the PCP column. These were calculated using the z-test for proportions with Yates’ continuity correction. Bold values indicated p-value <0.05
‡Proportions in this table are for respondents selecting the reasons below in either the “Most” or “2nd Most” important reason for any given referral relationship. Because two reasons are selected per relationship, the proportions in each column exceed 100%. Furthermore, the selected reasons may be in “Patient experiences with physician,” “Physician communication,” and “Patient access,” and so the within-category sums generally exceed the category proportion
§“Patient experience with MD” is the sum of the “My patients have good experiences with this physician” and “Physician has good patient rapport”
||“Patient Access” is the sum of “Timely availability…,” “Location convenient…,” “Patient request,” and “Speaks patient’s language”
¶“Physician communication” is the sum of “Physician refers…,” “Quality of communication…,” “Shares my medical record…,” and “Works in my hospital…”