Physicians’ Survey Captures New Insights on Affordable Care Act Ads, Impact on Private Practice and Future Job Choices for Doctors
Washington, DC (PRWEB) April 04, 2014 -- During the final week before the Affordable Care Act (ACA) signup deadline, MDLinx and M3 Global Research, both part of M3 Group of companies, a leading provider of online marketing solutions to the healthcare industry, created and conducted a survey with 602 physicians regarding their thoughts on the effectiveness of ACA advertising and the impact and ramifications of Obamacare. Administration officials confirmed to the New York Times that $52 million was spent on paid media over the first three months of this year in support of ACA enrollment. There are 7.1 million sign ups to date.
Nearly 90% of physicians surveyed not only saw the ads but viewed more than one of the ACA ads, with over 80% watching them on television. Nearly 60% felt that the ads were a least somewhat effective and that the physicians surveyed felt that the perceived target audience was mostly the young and uninsured.
One significant research finding was the physicians’ perception of how the ACA will affect their practices in the long term. Over 70% felt that a major impact of the ACA would be lower physician interest in private practice ownership in the next 3 years, resulting in more physicians choosing to become an employee in another group practice or hospital.
“We definitely see from our MDLinx Career Center job board and our conversations with recruiters and physicians as well, the perception that the ACA will significantly increase the numbers of physicians looking for new positions over the next few years,” comments Mathew Baker, Vice President of Physician Recruitment Advertising for MDLinx Career Center*, the largest Healthcare Professional website with a job board, reaching nearly 600,000 physicians in the US alone. “There is a common theme that with the ACA in place, physicians will have increased patient load, less time per patient, with lower reimbursements. More physicians choosing employee status rather than practice ownership, could then suggest a significant upswing in physicians looking for new positions over the next few years.”
Last night, at the Annual Southwestern Physician Recruiters Association (SWPRA) Conference held in Sacramento, California, Lori Vickers, a physician recruiter for Memorial Care Medical Group, based in Tustin, California, commented, “Recently I’ve been getting several calls a week from physicians who are proactively exploring the option of giving up their practices to become employees. Some have shared that they have questions about the ramifications of the ACA, and its possible effect on the business end of their practice.”
Additional research highlights from the survey of over 600 doctors include:
Most physicians (84%) believe that the ACA will have an impact on their practice in the next six months, with over half expecting lower reimbursements, and over a third expecting to see more patients, with less time spent per patient.
Physicians responded that their patients had an overall negative sentiment regarding healthcare changes, with 56% of doctors surveyed indicating that their patients communicated that the ACA would negatively impact healthcare, and only 10 % thinking changes would be mostly positive.
Similarly, two thirds of physicians shared that conversations with practice colleagues and staff indicated that they felt that ACA healthcare changes would be mostly negative, with just 7% saying that conversations were positive.
*Note: No M3 Group company was involved in advertising the ACA to patients, physicians or to the general public.
About M3 Group
The M3 Group operates in the US, Asia, and Europe with over 2.5 million physician members globally via its physician websites such as http://www.m3.com, http://www.mdlinx.com, http://research.m3.com, http://www.doctors.net.uk, http://www.medigate.net, http://www.medlive.cn and mdlinx.pdr.net. M3 Inc. is a publicly traded company on the Tokyo Stock Exchange (jp:2413) with subsidiaries in major markets including USA, UK, Japan, S. Korea, and China. M3 Group provides services to healthcare and the life science industry. In addition to market research and job recruitment, these services include medical education, ethical drug promotion, clinical development and clinic appointment services. M3 has offices in Tokyo, Washington D.C., Fort Washington, PA, Oxford, London, and Seoul.
M3 Group Sites:
research.m3.com mdlinx.com doctors.net.uk networksinhealth.com mdlinx.pdr.net
thesmartestdoc.com career.mdlinx.com medlive.cn medigate.net
Rich Britton, M3 USA Corporation, http://www.mdlinx.com, +1 202.293.2288 Ext: 221, [email protected]
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