Check out this New Online Physician Database

Zagat, Wellpoint to launch online physician database.

"Today, thanks to greater mobility (yours and the doctors'), rare is the lifelong doctor-patient relationship." In addition, some physicians have closed their practices, so it takes some effort to locate a new physician. Help is available from various sources, such as the AMA's DoctorFinder.

Another source of help might be a website which rates physicians, such as the one being launched by Zagat Survey and Wellpoint, the Chicago Tribune (11/4, Deardorff) added in separate article. The site will "allow consumers to rank doctors on a 30-point scale, just as diners rate restaurants." Advocates of this idea say that "doctor-rating sites promote much-needed transparency and are a natural part of the consumer-driven healthcare movement."

However, "several states and the American Medical Association have raised concerns about ratings programs run by health insurers, and the accuracy of the information on the sites." According to Rita Schwab, a professional in medical credentialing, such sites "may provide patients with some valuable information not easily obtained elsewhere, but all the information provided on these sites is subject to serious reliability issues."

Zagat's "online service, which will be available only to WellPoint clients, is hardly the first effort to make doctor information more widely available."

Other sites, such as RateMDs.com and Healthgrades.com, have also attempted to provide information on physicians. "Each of these sources is useful, but taken together, available doctor information is, well, pretty weak medicine."

Currently, no one site provides a combination of "qualitative and quantitative data, including information about outcomes, legal actions, education, specialties, feedback from other patients, costs, relevant comparisons, and other tips that rise above the scuttlebutt level."

"The medical and legal establishments have not been hurrying to solve, or even acknowledge, this problem." For instance, "Medicare has resisted making its claims database -- the largest collection of such information in the country -- available to raters." The Times pointed out that overall, such sites are getting better at providing need data, and "the Zagat/Wellpoint announcement is another small step toward making your choice of doctors as informed as your choice of burgers."