How to Design Effective Medical Surveys for Your Practice

Medical surveys can provide valuable insights and benefits for healthcare practices, but they also require careful planning and execution. According to a 2021 survey by the American Medical Association, 85% of physicians use telehealth, but only 60% agree that it enables them to provide high-quality care.

This and several other studies point out that there is plenty of room for improvement in the design and delivery of medical surveys to ensure that they are effective, reliable, and actionable.

In this blog post, we will guide you through the steps to design effective medical surveys for your practice. We will touch upon the six major six steps in designing effective medical surveys for your practice.

Step 1: Define your survey goals and objectives

The first step to designing effective medical surveys is to define your survey goals and objectives. You have to identify the purpose and scope of the survey and specify what information you want to collect, from whom, and for what reason. Your survey goals and objectives should be aligned with your practice’s mission, vision, and values, as well as with the intended patient outcomes.

Some examples of common survey goals and objectives are:

1. Measuring patient satisfaction
2. Evaluating employee engagement in healthcare institutions
3. Assessing positive and negative health outcomes
4. Testing new healthcare products or services, for eg: telehealth, patient wearables, therapie

Defining clear and specific goals and objectives is important because it helps you:

• Focus your survey on the most relevant and important topics
• Choose the best medical survey method and mode for your patients
• Design your survey questions and format so as to gather accurate insights
• Analyze and report your survey results that answer your research questions
• Take action based on your survey findings that support your practice goals

Step 2: Choose your survey method and mode

The second step to design effective medical surveys is to choose your survey method and mode. This means selecting the most appropriate way to design, distribute, and collect your survey data from your target audience, considering your budget and timeline.

Survey methods can be classified into four main types:

1. Self-administered surveys are those where respondents complete the questionnaire by themselves, either online, by mail, or by dropping off.
2. Interviewer-administered surveys refer to those surveys where a trained interviewer asks questions either face-to-face, by voice or video calls.
3. Mixed-mode surveys combine two or more survey methods, such as online and phone, or mail and face-to-face.
4. Adaptive surveys are those where you adjust the survey method or mode based on the response rate, availability, or preference of the respondents.

Survey modes are the specific ways you present and collect the survey questions and answers. They can be classified into three main types:

1. Text-based modes require the respondents to read and write the questions and answers, such as online surveys, mail surveys, or paper-and-pencil surveys.
2. Audio-based modes are those where respondents listen and speak the questions and answers, such as phone surveys, video call surveys, or voice message surveys.
3. Visual-based modes allow the respondents to see and interact with the questions and answers, such as web surveys, mobile app surveys, or touch screen surveys.

There is no one-size-fits-all solution for choosing a survey method and mode. It is upon you to weigh the pros and cons of each medical survey method and mode based on your specific research context and goals. You also need to consider ethical issues such as informed consent, confidentiality, and data protection when choosing a survey method and mode.

Step 3: Design your survey questions and format

The third step to design effective medical surveys is to design your survey questions and format. This means crafting clear, concise, and relevant survey questions that align with your goals and objectives, and formatting your survey to make it easy to read, understand, and complete.

Survey questions are the core of your survey research as they take the form of the tools used to collect the information you need from your respondents. To write good survey questions, you should follow these tips:

• Use simple and clear language devoid of technical jargon, technical terms, or acronyms
• Keep your questions and answers or options concise without unnecessary words or misleading details
• Ask one question at a time. Be specific and focused on one outcome
• Account for all possible answer choices
• Plan the question flow and choose your questions carefully

The good and bad examples provided below will help you understand the best practices in a better manner:

Example of a good survey question:

Q: How satisfied are you with the quality of care you received from your doctor?

Option 1.  Very Satisfied

Option 2.  Somewhat satisfied

Option 3.  Neither satisfied nor dissatisfied

Option 4.  Somewhat dissatisfied

Option 5.   Very dissatisfied

Example of a bad survey question:

Q: Don’t you think your doctor is awesome?

Option 1: Yes

Option 2: No

Step 4: Test and refine your survey

The fourth step to design effective medical surveys is to test and refine your survey before launching it to ensure that it works properly and meets your expectations. Testing your survey can help you identify and fix any problems or errors in your survey design, format, or logic, as well as improve the quality and validity of your data.

The most common methods of medical survey testing are:

• Pretesting
• Pilot testing
• Data analysis
• Cognitive interviewing
• Expert evaluation
• Focus groups
• A/B testing experiments
• Observational studies

Step 5: Distribute and promote your survey

The fifth step to design effective medical surveys is to distribute and promote your survey to your target audience using the chosen method and mode. This means delivering your survey to the respondents you want to reach and encouraging them to participate and complete the survey.

Depending on your survey method and mode, you can use different ways to distribute your survey, such as:

• Email invitations
• Website pop-ups
• Social media posts
• QR codes
• SMS messaging

But, more than distribution it is the process of increasing the awareness and interest of your potential respondents that matters more the success of your survey.

Depending on your survey goals and objectives, you can use different ways to promote your survey, such as:

• Offering incentives or rewards such as gift coupons, non-monetary gifts, etc.
• Providing feedback or results such as personalized reports, benchmarks, recommendations, or insights.
• Creating urgency or scarcity by setting a deadline or limiting the number of participants
• Building trust and credibility with previous participant testimonials, endorsements, etc.

Step 6: Analyze and report your survey results

The sixth and final step to design effective medical surveys is to analyze and report your survey results. This means processing and interpreting your survey data using appropriate statistical methods and tools, and presenting and communicating your findings and recommendations in a clear and compelling way.

Some of the common types of analysis are:

• Descriptive statistics
• Inferential statistics
• Visualizations

All the insights from these analyses can be presented in the form of dashboards, text reports, presentations, etc.

Wrapping Up: How to Design Effective Medical Surveys for Your Practice

By following these six steps, you will be able to create medical surveys that meet your needs and also patient expectations. They will help you unearth useful information about patient experience and outcomes that would ultimately improve your healthcare practice.

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