Researchers at Boston-based Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) have found that patients who received test results from physicians using an automated management system were more satisfied than patients whose physicians did not use the system.
The results are published in the Nov. 12 issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine.
Surveys were administered to 570 patients who visited 26 different ambulatory clinics; findings show that the implementation of an automated test results notification system significantly increased patient satisfaction with test results communication and that those patients were more satisfied with the information they received for treatments and conditions associated with their results.
This research was funded by grants from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality and the National Library of Medicine.
