Original ContributionsDoes wearing a necktie influence patient perceptions of emergency department care?
Introduction
Opinions as to what constitutes acceptable and proper attire for practicing emergency physicians (EPs) are varied. Traditional dress includes dress pants, shoes, shirt, and necktie with a white lab coat, while other options might include surgical scrubs, athletic footwear, or casual clothing with or without a lab coat. Although several studies have addressed patient and physician preferences and perceptions regarding multiple aspects of physician attire 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, no study has simply investigated one specific variable exclusively. We conducted a study attempting to determine the effect of wearing or not wearing a necktie by male EPs on patient impression of their overall medical encounter.
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Materials and methods
During a 6-week study period, all male students, residents, and attendings were assigned by dates to wear either a tie (T) or no tie (NT) by the use of a random number table. The setting for the study was a community teaching hospital with an Emergency Medicine (EM) residency and an annual census of approximately 40,000. All males were required to wear dress pants, buttoned dress shirts with a collar (which might be buttoned or unbuttoned), and shoes. White lab coats, sports jackets, surgical
Results
A total of 316 surveys were completed, 162 in the NT group and 154 in the T group. There were no statistically significant differences between the groups in their ratings regarding overall care, interactions with or appearance of the physician (p = 0.45, 0.56, and 0.49, respectively; see Figure 1 ). When asked about the physician’s appearance, 7.5% of patients gave an unfavorable score of 3 or less on NT days as compared to 3.9% on T days (p = 0.27).
Results demonstrated that 28.6% (46/161)
Discussion
Attitudes regarding physician attire have been discussed by several authors 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7. Most have surveyed physicians or interviewed patients concerning a variety of particular aspects of a physician’s dress that may impact positively or negatively on patients’ impression of the physician and his care 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. Colt and Solot reported that 73% of physicians believe that their physical appearance influences patients’ opinion of medical care received (1). A study relating attire to
Acknowledgements
The authors acknowledge John Krall, phd, for his statistical assistance.
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Cited by (16)
What you wear does not affect the credibility of your treatment: A blinded randomized controlled study
2017, Patient Education and CounselingCitation Excerpt :Our findings do not support the use of formal attire (suit, tie) among clinicians working in primary care and in so doing contrast with the dominant view held by clinicians [26,27] and the available evidence [6,15]. To our knowledge, only two other studies have randomized professional attire during a clinical encounter, although they did not evaluate effects on credibility [16,17]. Our results add to the findings of Fischer et al. [16] and Pronchik et al. [17] on measures of patient satisfaction, and support the notion that attire does not determine whether a patient views the treatment as credible or not during a clinical encounter.
Does physician attire influence patient satisfaction in an outpatient obstetrics and gynecology setting?
2007, American Journal of Obstetrics and GynecologyCitation Excerpt :The results of our study are consistent with 4 others in which patient satisfaction surveys were administered after encounters with physicians in different attires. Pronchik et al11 randomized male attendings, residents, and students in an emergency department to wear a necktie or no necktie over a 6-week period. Patients completing a postencounter survey had similar ratings between the 2 groups with regard to medical care, interaction, and general physician appearance.
Patient preference for emergency physician age and gender [14]
2004, American Journal of Emergency MedicineScrubs versus professional attire: ED patients are indifferent [4]
2004, American Journal of Emergency Medicine