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After visit summaries (AVSs) are the main tool to communicate appropriate follow-up recommendations for patients after an episode of care, and for some providers in Medicare enhanced-payment contracts, the summaries are a requirement. Yet some clinicians might view the task of writing AVSs as a time-consuming burden, especially when patients may not even read their summaries. An analysis published in JAMA Network Open of more than 6.2 million ambulatory visits from June 1, 2018, to May 31, 2023, conducted at a large, urban, academic health system, found that patient engagement with digital AVSs increased over time—from 20.8% in 2018 to 37.6% in 2023. Urgent care visits had the highest engagement rate (40.9%), compared with 39.5% in primary care, 36.4% in medical specialties, and 36.0% in surgical specialties. Researchers also found that more than 62% of the AVSs were never viewed at all.
Take your time: Urgent care clinicians spent a median 1.93 minutes per visit composing summaries—more than any other clinician. Overall, physicians spent a median of 1.38 minutes per visit composing AVSs. Patients were more likely to view the AVSs when clinicians included personalized written instructions (40.5% vs 34.3%). Engagement in reading the summaries was lower among men, non-English speakers, publicly insured patients, and older adults.