A tale of two countries: International comparison of online doctor reviews between China and the United States

Abstract

BackgroundWorldwide, patients have posted millions of online reviews for their doctors. The rich textual information in the online reviews holds the potential to generate insights into how patients’ experience with their doctors differ across nations and how should we use them to improve our health service. ObjectiveWe apply customized text mining techniques to compare online doctor reviews from China and the United States, in order to measure the systematic differences in patient reviews between the two countries, and assess the potential insights that can be derived from this large volume of online text data. MethodsWe compare the textual reviews of obstetrics and gynecology (OBGYN) doctors from the two most popular online doctor rating websites in the U.S. and China, respectively: RateMDs.com and Haodf.com. We apply a customized text mining technique, Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) topic modeling to identify the major topics in positive and negative reviews of those two countries. We then compare their similarities and differences. ResultsAmong the positive reviews, both Chinese and American patients talked about medical treatment, bedside manner, and appreciation/recommendation, but Chinese patients commented more about medical treatment while American patients focused more on recommendation. Also, reviews about bedside manner from Chinese patients were more related to doctors while on the American side, they were more about staff. This reflects the difference between the two countries’ health systems. Further, among the negative reviews, both countries’ patients talked about medical treatment, bedside manner, and logistics. However, Chinese patients focus more on the registration process, while American patients are more related to the staff, wait time, and insurance, which further shows the differences between the two nations’ health systems. ConclusionsOnline doctor reviews contain valuable information that can generate insights on the similarities and differences of patient experience across nations. They are useful assets to assist healthcare consumers, providers, and administrators in moving toward a patient-centered care. In this age of big data, online doctor reviews can be a valuable source for international perspectives on healthcare systems.