12
June
2019
|
17:59 PM
America/New_York

Could a doctor wearing a white coat impact patient satisfaction?

WTNH reports on a national study by Bradford S. Waddell, MD, hip and knee surgeon at HSS, which asked more than 1,100 patients at 10 health facilities to rate surgeons on a number of topics (i.e. satisfaction, intelligence, trust, etc.), based on whether the surgeon was wearing a white lab coat.

WTNH spoke to Dr. Waddell about the findings, who said, “Overall - whether you were wearing scrubs with a white coat or a tie or no tie with a white coat, white coat won. Everyone preferred a white coat overall." Alice Chen, MD, physiatrist at HSS, was not surprised by the outcome, and provided a comment to WTNH stating, “I definitely see that patients feel more at ease. They know who their doctor is and they seem more confident.”

Watch the segment at WTNH.com. This segment also aired during the evening news hour on June 12, 2019.