MD Reviews - Both Sides of The Story

If you’ve been paying attention to the news, you are probably aware that MD reviews are the subject of quite a bit of controversy. Both insurance companies and independent online sites have begun aggregating MD reviews for the benefits of their customers, and not all doctors are happy with the way things are going. With insurance companies, doctors feel they are being rated according to irrelevant criteria and unfair practices. With online sites, physicians groups worry about those who go on the sites with an axe to grind, or the competition paying people to post up fake ratings. They are systems intended to support the patient, but do they do what they are supposed to?

Starting only a couple of years ago, but quickly gaining traction, is a system of rankings and MD reviews being used by many of the major insurance companies across the country. These companies use a complex system to determine which doctors provide the highest quality service while keeping costs at a reasonable level. Of course, it’s not difficult to see how an insurance company may not have the best interests of the patient in mind. Stories abound of insurance companies making decisions based solely on the bottom line—money—and this isn’t usually how people like to make their healthcare choices. Still, when the companies give incentives to customers for choosing highly ranked doctors, it becomes a system that’s hard to fight against.

In a similar vein, several websites have begun popping up offering rankings and opinions straight from patients and customers. Since these will be from the point of view you’re most interested in, many potential patients find them rather more helpful than some insurance company’s algorithm of physician rankings. At the same time, these sites are not without their controversy, either. Many physicians have spoken out against them, warning that patients with ulterior motives could easily post up opinions that could sway others in the wrong direction.

All that being said, there’s no doubt that patients have more choices and better information these days than at any time in the past. Some of the information may not be that great, but it is up to the consumer to determine what weight to give any single review process. At the very least, the average person has a lot more to go on than they did even a few years ago. With some tweaking to both the online and insurance company system, we may soon see a plethora of md reviews that can help everyone.