What's in a name? Laypeople's understanding of medical roles and titles

Abstract

Background: Physicians regularly use jargon in patient communication, which can lead to confusion and misunderstanding.

Objective: To assess the general public's understanding of names and roles of medical specialties and job seniority titles.

Designs: Volunteer participants completed an electronic survey, filling-in-the-blanks for 14 medical specialties (e.g., "pediatricians are doctors who take care of _____"), and ranked physician titles in order of experience (medical student, intern, senior resident, fellow, attending).

Setting: The 2021 Minnesota State Fair.

Participants: Volunteers >18 years old without medical or nursing training.

Main outcome and measures: We summarized responses with descriptive statistics. Two researchers coded open-ended answers as correct, partially correct, or incorrect, with a third researcher for coding discrepancies.

Results: Two hundred and four participants completed the survey (55% female; mean age 43; 67% of respondents with a bachelor's degree or higher). Of 14 medical specialties listed on the survey, respondents most accurately identified dermatologists (94%) and cardiologists (93%). Six specialties were understood by less than half of the respondents: neonatologists (48%), pulmonologists (43%), hospitalists (31%), intensivists (29%), internists (21%), and nephrologists (20%). Twelve percent of participants correctly identified medical roles in rank order. Most participants (74%) correctly identified medical students as the least experienced. Senior residents were most often identified as the most experienced (44%), with just 27% of respondents correctly placing the attending there. We conclude that medical professionals should recognize that titles are a common source of misunderstanding among the general public and should describe their role when introducing themselves to minimize confusion.