Tech Survey: Patient Portal Use on the Rise

Practices are getting more patients to use the patient portal, according to the latest batch of data from the 2017 Physicians Practice Technology Survey. The survey, which looks at medical practice technology use, based on more than 500 (mostly independent) practices across the U.S., found that 72.2 percent of respondents say their practice has a patient portal. This is up from 61.9 percent that took the survey in 2016.The biggest challenge in utilizing the patient portal remains the same from 2016 to 2017: getting patients to sign up for it. More than 65 percent of respondents say this is their biggest issue with the portal, four times as much as the next closest answer.A few other highlights of this second batch of Tech Survey data include:
• 44.5 percent of practices say they use applications on iPhones, Android devices, or other smartphones in their day-to-day jobs.
• Only 5 percent of practices use technology that tracks and monitors a patient's health status, such as a Fitbit.
• 73.5 percent of practices have conducted a HIPAA risk analysis, up from 62.3 percent who took the survey in 2016. For those that haven't conducted one, 57.5 percent say they plan on getting one done in the next six months, up from 48.1 percent who answer this question affirmatively in 2016.
• Only 11 percent of practices who responded to the survey don't have an EHR - the lowest total ever for the Tech Survey.The rest of the results are above. The first batch of Tech Survey results are available here.Click here to download a PDF of this slideshow.