The pace of change and evolution when it comes to technology and medicine has increased exponentially over the last 20 years — yet gaps in care persist across the U.S., and physicians have reported that relationships with patients feel more strained than in the past.
Technology presents a significant opportunity to close these gaps, Alejandro Badia, MD, hand surgeon at Miami-based Badia Hand to Shoulder Center told Becker’s, particularly when it comes to patient education.
“Much of the world is connected with this little device that not only allows us to be connected, but to look up information,” he said. “This is a great opportunity to do something that we don’t get to do enough us as clinicians, which is patient education. Technology bridges us together.”
On the flip side, some physicians say that medical information available on the internet has mis-educated their patients, which sometimes causes tension during appointments or exams when physicians have to combat potentially incorrect or misapplied information.
However, Dr. Badia contends that if leveraged effectively and correctly, technology can free up more time for physicians to strengthen their patient relationships, reducing the need for them to seek out information online. This may be especially true when it comes to combatting medical myths in orthopedics.
“The average person thinks that tennis elbow is from tennis, or carpal tunnel syndrome is due to typing,” he said. “These are common, prevalent myths among the most educated people, including other doctors. If doctors spent more time helping educate patients, then these kinds of voices on the internet would diminish.”
The problem, Dr. Badia said, is that many of the people spreading medical misinformation online are much better at marketing and branding than the average physician, making their content more accessible to patients, regardless of its accuracy. If physicians can learn to utilize social media and other evolving, patient-focused technologies to access them before they see out information online, the result could be a more educated and cooperative patient population.
“They’re going to follow your protocols better, they’re going to be more engaged,” Dr. Badia said. “All of those things are good, and technology has allowed us to do that.
