Nowadays, doctors and patients are increasingly relying on encrypted messaging. The invention advanced quickly during the COVID-19 epidemic, as good electronic communication became essential.
Recently, a research team undertook a computer study of hundreds of thousands of secure email conversations between doctors and patients. They discovered that most doctors employ complex language for their patients to understand. The research findings are relevant for the Connected Healthcare Market as it would help the sector remove hurdles and make communication between doctors and patients easier and efficient.
To prevent confusing people with the least health literacy, experts on health literacy and top health care organizations have recommended clinicians always use simple language when describing things to their patients.
Therefore, the researchers looked at the overall trends of individual clinicians to determine if they tended to customize their communications to their patients' various levels of health literacy. According to the survey, the majority of doctors did not do so. Around 40% of patients with inadequate health literacy had doctors who spoke simple languages.
The study discovered that doctors who scored highest on surveys of how well their patients understood their care tended to adjust their electronic messages to their patients' degree of health literacy, regardless of where they were on the spectrums.
The researchers used machine learning and computer algorithms to evaluate the linguistic complexity of the doctors' statements and their patients' health literacy.
The study sets a new standard for the research scale on doctor-patient communication by using a collection of over 250,000 secure messages exchanged between diabetes patients and their doctors through Kaiser Permanente's secure email portal. Typically, research involving doctor-patient communication is studied with the help of small data sets and often does not consider objective metrics.
Researchers added that patients were asked to assess the level of understanding linked with their doctor's prescriptions. It was noted that most of the understanding was based on how the individual felt about their doctor's verbal and written communications. Nonetheless, the ratings were found to be strongly related to the doctor's written communication style.
In contrast to a clinic visit, where a doctor can utilize visual signals or verbal input from each patient to confirm knowledge, a doctor can never be sure that their patient understood the written information in an email discussion. According to the findings, patients benefit when doctors modify their email communications to match the complexity of the patient's language.