Vitals – where doctors are examined

♥♥♥Recommendation doctor rating

Combines consumer reviews, peer reviews and empirical data on a doctor’s quality

www.vitals.com 

The website is focused on the examining and rating of doctors. There is also the possibility to find a doctor close to the user: you can find it through the description of your symptoms (the website tells you which kind of doctor to visit), through a name search and through the doctor’s speciality. The website rates the doctor using consumer reviews, peer reviews and empirical information. The consumer reviews are not that difficult to find, the empirical information is mostly focussed on the ratings of the medical schools and hospitals (done by the Princeton Review, US Government and other sources) and the peer reviews. Peers are people working in the same profession. A peer of a cardiologist is another cardiologist. Cardiologists review other cardiologists.

Check up on your doctor
To check up your doctor you just have to fill in the form with the doctor’s name and location.

Find a doctor
If you are not searching a doctor but want to know which kind of doctor you need depending on your symptoms, you can search for on ailment. You may choose a gender (female, male, child) and the part of the body where your symptoms are related. The system automatically recommends what kind of doctor you need to visit. You can also directly choose a doctor’s speciality, filling the specific form: the speciality and a subcategory of the speciality and a doctor specialised in this close by. When the system gives some results, you can choose the quality of the doctors, like ABMS qualified doctors only or exclude doctors which are rated poorly by their patients.
You can also refine your results by ranking the parameters which are more important for you. The parameters are:
 - quality of training;
 - quality of hospital;
 - years of experience;
 - travel distance.
You may also compare two or three doctors to review differences.

Rate a doctor
First fill in name and location of a doctor.  Then rate him using seven questions:
 - ease in getting an appointment;
 - waiting time during a visit;
 - courtesy and professionalism of office staff;
 - accuracy in diagnosing a problem;
 - bedside manner;
 - spending enough time with patient;
 - following up as needed after visit.
You can rate this with Poor – Moderate – Good – Excellent – Don’t know.

You can post a title and comment text. You may optionally fill in your name. After rating you are asked to agree with the terms of use, policy of privacy etc. You don’t have to fill in your name or e-mail adress. You may rate a doctor only once a month to avoid repeated rating from the same individual, which may affect the quality of rating.

The system provides information about the doctor: his speciality, years of experience, adress (with map) and phone number. Users will find information about the hospital the doctor is affiliated with and the university and hospital where he completed his education (hospital and university are not rated by the users but from sources as Priceteon Rewiev and U.S. Government). The doctor’s distinctions are also listed. Articles published in medical jounals by the doctor are listed, including a short excerpt. To incresae transparency, the website marks items written by the doctor him/herself with a grey dot.

Business Modell
Advertisement is easy to recognize on the website. It is always on the right and top of the page. On the same level as the website title Vitals is an advertisement from Vitals itself. It’s a pdf book, containing a lot of information about the doctors. You can leave your email adress and they will send it to you by mail.
One of Vitals’ strategic partner ist Castle Conolly, which has been publishing America’s Top Doctors since 1991.

————————————Pro und Contra———————————

++ Combination of  peer reviews, consumer reviews and empirical reviews.
+ You may find doctors using symptoms or anatomical figures (female, male and child).
+ A lot of information about the doctors.
+ Website warns people with a grey dot when doctors temselves have filled in items.
+ You may rate a doctor only once a month.

- Peer reviews (doctor is rating doctor) may be subject to manipulation (as other ratings, too).
- Method of peer reviews not specified.
- Not HON accredited.
- Not enough ratings per doctor (problem shared by all these portals).
- You may rate a doctor anymonous.

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