40% of Physicians Use E-mail, Instant Messaging, or Secure Messaging Services to Communicate With Patients

OPEN MINDS Weekly News Wire Strategic Health Care News In 2009, about 40% of physicians said they communicated with patients via e-mail, instant messaging, or secure messaging service. Those physicians who said they had not used electronic communications cited fear of liability and concerns about how on-line communications would benefit practice efficiency. This statistic is from a physician market study entitled “Taking the Pulse v9.0” by Manhattan Research, a unit of Decision Resources Inc. The researchers contacted a nationally representative sample of physicians in the first quarter of 2009. They administered a survey via telephone and on . . .