There is no uniform definition of patient engagement, nor is there an agreed upon way in which to foster it.

Patient engagement is healthcare’s latest buzz word. That is not to say it isn’t an important concept… it is. The difficulty is that there is no uniform definition of patient engagement, nor is there an agreed upon way in which to foster it. A recent national study sheds some light on the issue.

Presented at HIMSS15 in Chicago a few weeks ago, “Three Perspectives of Patient Engagement: A National Study” is a collaboration between HIMSS Analytics, WebMD, Medscape and M-Consulting, LLC. The study was partially funded by Genentech.

Christina Hoffman, Vice President of Quality and Strategy at Medscape joined Pat Salber MD () to talk about the results of the recent Medscape survey on attitudes about patient engagement. Because the survey included not only docs and patients, but also Chief Information Officers, the results may surprise you.

Here’s a few highlights:

• Docs and patients think patient engagement is about the physician-patient relationship
• CIOs think it is about technology. Because they think it is about technology, CIOs think they “own” patient engagement.
• Providers believe patients need to take more responsibility, whereas patients think providers need to spend more time with them.
• When it comes to barriers to patient engagement, CIOs think the expectations of patients and providers are the problem.
• Providers say it’s time demands and training and patients think it is the provider’s time.

Watch the video to learn more.

Also, check out our blog post on The Doctor Weighs In for more information.

This video is under BY-ND creative commons.