Messages on healthy living found to miss many women

Fewer than half of nearly 3,000 women surveyed had talked to a physician about preventive care.

By Susan J. Landers, AMNews staff. July 25, 2005.

Washington -- Physicians are not taking advantage of all opportunities to counsel women patients about healthy behaviors, according to survey results released on July 7 by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

That finding becomes even more serious when coupled with responses from more than half of the 2,766 women surveyed last year that they are more likely to turn to their physicians for information rather than the Internet, family and friends, or books.

But cramming all of the necessary discussion items into a 15-minute exam is a difficult juggling act for many physicians, said a panel of experts assembled to discuss the survey.

For one thing, the all-important preventive health care conversation is not necessarily reimbursable under a patient's health plan, noted Alina Salganicoff, PhD, vice president and director of Women's Health Policy at the Kaiser Family Foundation. Providing physicians and others with the means to talk about these topics is an important goal, she said.

In addition, physician face time with patients is often consumed with helping patients gain access to affordable specialty care, said Susan Starr Sered, PhD, senior research associate at Suffolk University's Center for Women's Health and Human Rights in Boston.

Also, it takes a superorganized physician to make sure that patients have all of the necessary referrals for screenings before they leave the office, said Carolyn Clancy, MD, director of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, describing her own races to beat her patients to the door.