A prominent orthopedic surgeon has leveraged the platform of mass media outlet Fortune to call for increased transparency among his peers and their institutions to enable patients to make more informed decisions about whom they will allow to operate on them.
Mathias Bostrom, MD, associate surgeon-in-chief and director of quality and safety at Hospital for Special Surgery, writes that “Americans commonly check restaurant reviews and ratings to make sure they don’t get a bad meal. It should be just as common for patients to compare their physicians and hospitals before undergoing a major procedure. And it’s up to the healthcare system to start proactively providing that evidence.”
He adds that “most Americans don’t realize they can, and should, shop around. Instead, they rely on referrals from primary care physicians or recommendations from friends and family. Those referrals are well-intentioned, but they are not always grounded in objective performance metrics. That’s a problem.”
Dr. Bostrom also outlines three questions every patient should ask a surgeon before they agree to undergo a major procedure with them.
Read the full opinion piece here.
