health
Patients who put GP's name in email are more likely to get a reply
Researchers from Harvard University in the US analysed 3.6 million patient messages from more than 511,000 people.
TL;DR
- Including a doctor's name in patient messages nearly doubles the chance of receiving a reply.
- Message writing style, such as greetings, formality, and sentiment, impacts response rates.
- Messages addressing a doctor by name had a nearly 40% response rate, compared to 26% without such a greeting.
- Patients who were not native English speakers, less educated, or non-white were less likely to have their queries answered.
- Message writing style may be a source of bias in message triage and could help mitigate disparities.