Table 4.
No. (%) Physicians Who Answered Moderately Agree or Strongly Agree to Each Cost-Consciousness Scale Item by Hospital Care Intensity of Primary Training Hospital
| Overall | HCIa of Training Hospital | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lowest Care Intensity Quartile | Highest Care Intensity Quartile | P value | ||
| I try not to think about the cost to the health care system when making treatment decisions (n = 2321) | 957 (41) | 224 (38) | 235 (41) | .30 |
| Cost to society is important in my decisions to use or not to use an intervention (n = 2312) | 1250 (54) | 331 (57) | 301 (53) | .20 |
| Physicians should adhere to clinical guidelines that discourage the use of interventions that have a small proven advantage over standard interventions but cost much more (n = 2308) | 1835 (80) | 466 (81) | 443 (78) | .20 |
| The cost of a test or medication is only important if the patient has to pay for it out of pocket (n = 2322) | 359 (15) | 91 (16) | 90 (16) | .92 |
| Doctors are too busy to worry about costs of tests and procedures (n = 2324) | 615 (26) | 138 (24) | 166 (29) | .04 |
| Trying to contain costs is the responsibility of every physician (n = 2315) | 1974 (85) | 500 (86) | 462 (81) | .04 |
| There is currently too much emphasis on costs of tests and procedures (n = 2310) | 780 (34) | 170 (29) | 225 (40) | <.001 |
| Doctors need to take a more prominent role in limiting the use of unnecessary tests (n = 2314) | 2047 (88) | 522 (90) | 488 (86) | .03 |
| It is unfair to ask physicians to be cost-conscious and still keep the welfare of their patients foremost in their minds (n = 2311) | 966 (42) | 225 (39) | 262 (46) | .01 |
| I should be solely devoted to my individual patients’ best interests, even if that is expensive (n = 2311) | 1794 (78) | 436 (75) | 438 (77) | .58 |
| Decision support tools that show costs would be helpful in my practice (n = 2345) | 1636 (70) | 436 (75) | 400 (68) | .006 |
a
HCI = Hospital Care Intensity index