The physician-patient relationship: the impact of patient-obtained medical information

We investigate the impact of patient‐obtained medical information (POMI) on the physician–patient relationship when patients, as a group, are heterogeneously informed and a physician's interests do not coincide with those of her patients. Introducing additional well‐informed patients to the pop...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Health economics 2006-08, Vol.15 (8), p.813-833
Main Authors: Xie, Bin, Dilts, David M., Shor, Mikhael
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Clinical information
Doctor-Patient relationships
Health economics
Humans
Information seeking
Information Storage and Retrieval
Medical Informatics
Models, Statistical
Models, Theoretical
Patient Participation
patient population
patient-obtained medical information
Physician-Patient Relations
physician-patient relationship
Policy Making
supplier-induced demand
United States
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Summary:We investigate the impact of patient‐obtained medical information (POMI) on the physician–patient relationship when patients, as a group, are heterogeneously informed and a physician's interests do not coincide with those of her patients. Introducing additional well‐informed patients to the population discontinuously affects the physician's strategy, having no effect unless a sufficient quantity is added. When few patients are well informed, increasing the precision of their information level has no effect on the physician's strategy. Alternately, when a sufficient number of well‐informed patients exists, increasing the precision of their information allows all patients to free‐ride by receiving more appropriate treatment recommendations. Counterintuitively, we also identify circumstances under which increasing the general level of information may potentially harm patients. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
ISSN:1057-9230
1099-1050
DOI:10.1002/hec.1098