Journal Article

The Association Between Linguistic Characteristics of Physicians’ Communication and Their Economic Returns: Mixed Method Study

Geng, Shuang, Duan, Liezhen, Niu, Ben, Yang, Chen, Liang, Gemin, Wu, Xusheng, He, Yuqin

2024

Overview

Web-based health care has the potential to improve health care access and convenience for patients with limited mobility, but its success depends on active physician participation. The economic returns of internet-based health care initiatives are an important factor that can motivate physicians to continue their participation. Although several studies have examined the communication patterns and influences of web-based health consultations, the correlation between physicians' communication characteristics and their economic returns remains unexplored. This study aims to investigate how the linguistic features of 2 modes of physician-patient communication, instrumental and affective, determine the physician's economic returns, measured by the honorarium their patients agree to pay per consultation. We also examined the moderating effects of communication media (web-based text messages and voice messages) and the compounding effects of different communication features on economic returns. We collected 40,563 web-based consultations from 528 physicians across 4 disease specialties on a large, web-based health care platform in China. Communication features were extracted using linguistic inquiry and word count, and we used multivariable linear regression and K-means clustering to analyze the data. We found that the use of cognitive processing language (ie, words related to insight, causation, tentativeness, and certainty) in instrumental communication and positive emotion-related words in affective communication were positively associated with the economic returns of physicians. However, the extensive use of discrepancy-related words could generate adverse effects. We also found that the use of voice messages for service delivery magnified the effects of cognitive processing language but did not moderate the effects of affective processing language. The highest economic returns were associated with consultations in which the physicians used few expressions related to negative emotion; used more terms associated with positive emotions; and later, used instrumental communication language. Our study provides empirical evidence about the relationship between physicians' communication characteristics and their economic returns. It contributes to a better understanding of patient-physician interactions from a professional-client perspective and has practical implications for physicians and web-based health care platform executives.

• Publisher: Journal of Medical Internet Research,Gunther Eysenbach MD MPH, Associate Professor,JMIR Publications
• Subject: Analysis / Anxiety / Causality / Clustering / Cognition / Cognition & reasoning / Communication / Data processing / Dictionaries / Disease / Economic aspects / Economic factors / Emotions / Executives / Health care access / Health care reform / Health initiatives / Health services / Humans / Hypotheses / Internet / Interpersonal communication / Language / Language usage / Linguistics / Mass media / Mass media effects / Methods / Mixed methods research / Mobility / Participation / Patient communication / Patient satisfaction / Patients / Physician and patient / Physician patient relationships / Physicians / Positive emotions / Practitioner patient relationship / Prices / Quality of service / Side effects / Social support / Text messaging / Voice / Words