North Shore-LIJ Health System began posting online ratings of its physicians this week, making it the latest system to join a handful of others doing so.
It took the system nearly two years to compile the data and earn physician support for online ratings, according to the Wall Street Journal. Patients can rate physicians on a scale of one to five stars, and ratings are only displayed if the physician has opted in to the system and receives at least 30 evaluations. So far, the lowest rating is a 3.63 and the highest is a 4.93.
North Shore-LIJ told WSJ it is the first system in the New York metropolitan area to post online ratings of physicians, and only a few other health systems across the U.S. have done the same.
University of Utah Health Care says it was the first in the nation to do so. It began posting star ratings of physicians in 2012. Cleveland Clinic, Wake Forest Baptist Health in Winston-Salem, N.C., Stanford (Calif.) Health Care and Atlanta-based Piedmont Healthcare have since followed suit. Earlier this month, UPMC launched its online ratings, based on 200,000 reviews of more than 1,600 physicians, nurse practitioners, midwives and other providers, collected by South Bend, Ind.-based Press Ganey.
San Diego-based Scripps Health also launched an online rating system for two of its medical groups this month. The system is posting Press Ganey patient satisfaction survey results for physicians practicing within Scripps Clinic or Scripps Coastal medical groups.
Similar to North Shore-LIJ and UPMC, Scripps physicians must have a minimum of 30 surveys for scores to be posted. Ratings are updated monthly on a rolling 12-month basis.