Doctors taking more time with their patients: study

By Sheilah Downey

Doctors spent more time with their patients and delivered higher quality medical care, according to a study taken between 1997 and 2005.

While time for the average visit increased by only minutes, from 18 to 20.8 minutes over the course of the 8 year study, researchers concluded doctors are taking more time because their patients are feeling the effects of old age.

"Although it is possible that physicians have become less efficient over time, it is far more likely that visit duration has increased because it takes more resources or time to care for an older and sicker population," stated the authors.

Dr. Lena M. Chen, of the University of Michigan Health System, Ann Arbor, and colleagues analyzed 46,250 visits to primary care physicians by adults 18 years and older during the study period. They found that doctor visits increased by 10 percent during that time, from 273 million to 338 million each year, and that quality of the visits improved in many areas.

"Comparing the early period (1997 to 2001) with the late period (2002 to 2005) quality of care improved for one of three counseling or screening indicators and for four of six medication indicators," wrote the authors.

For general medical exams, visits increased by 3.4 minutes. Researchers also found that visits for counseling or screening took 2.6 to 4.2 minutes longer than visits without those services.

Dealing with an older population may require a laundry list of improvements to the health care system, said researchers, who also suggested that doctors should be paid more.

"Improvements in quality of care will likely require a combination of investments in systems," wrote the authors, "such as electronic health records, greater use of other professionals such as nurse practitioners and better reimbursement to primary care physicians for the extra time spent."

The study was published in the Nov. 9 issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine, one of the JAMA/Archives journals.