Do poor patients suffer from inaccurate diagnoses more than well-to-do patients? A randomized control trial.

BACKGROUND: Poor patients have greater morbidity and die up to 10 years earlier than patients who have higher socio-economic status. These findings are often attributed to differences in life-style between groups. The present study aimed at investigating the extent to which physicians contribute to the effect by providing relative poorer care, resulting in relative neglect in terms of time spent with a poor patient and more inaccurate diagnoses. METHODS: A randomised experiment with 45 internal medicine residents. Doctors diagnosed 12 written clinical vignettes that were exactly the same except for the description of the patients' socio-economic status. Each participant diagnosed four of the vignettes in a poor-patient version, four in a rich-patient version, and four in a version that did not contain socio-economic markers, in a balanced within-subjects incomplete block design. Main measurements were: diagnostic accuracy scores and time spent on diagnosis. RESULTS: Mean diagnostic accuracy scores (range 0-1) did not significantly differ among the conditions of the experiment (for poor patients: 0.48; for rich patients: 0.52; for patients without socio-economic markers: 0.54; p > 0.05). While confronted with patients not presenting with socio-economic background information, the participants spent significantly less time-to-diagnosis ((for poor patients: 168 s; for rich patients: 176 s; for patients without socio-economic markers: 151 s; p < 0.01), however due to the fact that the former vignettes were shorter. CONCLUSION: There is no reason to believe that physicians are prejudiced against poor patients and therefore treat them differently from rich patients or patients without discernible socio-economic background.

Risk of diagnostic errors when dealing with aggressive patients: Experimental study.

Medical errors are still common despite advances in technology and policies to insure patients' safety. They can be traceable as in medications or surgical errors, but may not be so in diagnostic errors that are patient, physician, or system related. This study aimed to explore whether aggressive behavior of some patients might affect physicians' clinical reasoning and decision-making. The study was conducted in a format of observation skills clinical examinations (OSCEs). It included simulating patients (SPs) and family physicians in residency training in a clinical setup. The experiment included two arms of dealing with case scenarios with "Neutral" and "Aggressive" behaviors. Explanatory variables assessed were duration of consultation, correct diagnosis, and plan of appropriate management as well as patients' satisfaction. Participants were 14 trained SPs who played the roles of aggressive and nonaggressive patients when they encountered 35 residents (18 were males) in family physicians [year 2 (R2), year 3 (R3) and year 4 (R4)]; in a total of seventy patient/doctor encounters. Compared with nonaggressive patients, aggressive patients had statistically significantly prolonged OSCE duration [mean (standard deviation) = 6.89 (1.35) and 6.11 (157) min, respectively; P = 0.031] and more patient consultation satisfaction (P <0.0001). However, no statistically significant differences were found in diagnostic accuracy (P = 0.626) and management (P = 0.621). In a stratified analysis, junior doctors had longer duration of consultation and seemed to perform better in management (higher patient satisfaction and better management outline) than their senior counterparts. Patients' aggressive behavior led to longer duration of medical consultation. Poor management plan, albeit correct diagnosis, in senior doctors may be due to disruptive clinical reasoning in disturbed stressful situation. Coping strategies should be emphasized in medical education to ensure effective clinical reasoning in patient/doctor encounters.