Addressing Barriers to Physician Change

In past newsletters, we’ve addressed professional practice gaps—the divergences between what physicians are currently doing and what they should be doing. Identifying these gaps is the first step in understanding what knowledge needs to be imparted to your participants. To develop an effective activity, your planning process should also include the recognition of barriers to physician change. In other words, what is stopping physicians from implementing best practice? Some barriers might include:

• Time
• Habit
• Lack of appropriate patients
• Patients and co-workers in the work setting resistant
  to change

Barriers can be physician-related, at the patient level, or systemic. Physician-related barriers might include lack of agreement with new or updated clinical practice guidelines, resistance to change/inertia, or “information overload” leading to lack of awareness about new treatments or procedures. Patient-level barriers can include noncompliance with treatment, limited or no health insurance coverage, or inaccurate perceptions/beliefs regarding treatments (i.e., such as parents who fear immunizing their children). Often barriers to change are systemic and as such, may be more difficult to address with education alone. Some systemic barriers include time constraints, reimbursement challenges, lack of resources, and institutional restrictions.¹

A recent study published in the Journal of Medical Systems, focused on barriers to physicians' adoption of healthcare information technology, specifically electronic medical records (EMRs). This research presents an insight into the participating physicians' rejection of EMRs and the antecedents of this outcome. Why are some physicians averse to adopting an EMR? For the healthcare industry, understanding the factors contributing to physicians' acceptance of a new behavior is essential to ensuring a smooth implementation of any new technology. This study proves that identifying and addressing barriers to physicians' change early can result in a more positive outcome.²

Now that you can identify the barriers your participants are facing, how do you help them overcome them? If you know that your learners are struggling with noncompliance issues, you may decide to incorporate patient education tools into your activity. This will give your learners the tools to teach their patients about the consequences of noncompliance and give them the information they need to achieve compliance. Since time is a limited resource for many physicians, you might also want to focus on time management skills in your activity, so that physicians can make time for patient education.

References:

1. The Endocrine Society. Defining and Identifying professional practice gaps. Available at: http://www.endo-society.org/education/defining-and-identifying-professional-practice-gaps.cfm. Accessed September 2011.
2. Lin C, Lin IC, Roan J. Barriers to Physicians' Adoption of Healthcare Information Technology: An Empirical Study on Multiple Hospitals. J Med Syst. 2011 Feb 19.

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Online education is a major asset to any healthcare organization’s continuing education program. Some benefits of CFMC’s online eLearning services include:

• Reaching a National Audience
• Affordable
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• Accredited Programs Developed Based upon Adult Learning Principles
• Electronic Evaluations & Outcomes Measurement Tools
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Visit yourCEsource.org for more information about our continuing education services to award credit to physicians, nurses, psychologists, and others. You may also call Lorraine Pickrell at 1-800-950-8250, ext. 3372.

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