How We Choose Hospitals According to Google

Google’s new hospital study says that 94 percent of people choose a hospital based on reputation, which is good news for the hospitals in our area, since we have some of the top hospitals in the country, including number one, according to U.S News & World Report. But the tools used to research hospitals and healthcare have changed. What role does the digital age play in choosing hospitals and healthcare? Google attempts to answer this question with their new infographic (posted below).

The digital design teams at Tufts Medical Center and Floating Hospital for Children are using this kind of information for marketing and website redesign.

Shawn Gross, director of service line marketing and web strategy at Tufts Medical Center, says that Google is essentially a hospital’s homepage with 75 to 80 percent of website traffic coming from a Google search. “Patients typically learn about their condition from their primary care doctor and arrive at a tertiary care hospital website post-diagnosis, after doing a few keyword searches,” Gross says. “Hospital marketers should try to think like patients researching their care options.”

Gross says that the the content available now plays a growing role in helping patients select a hospital and its physicians. “As hospitals design digital content strategies going forward, they will need to meet the needs of consumers who expect to be able to interact with their caregivers, make appointments, pay bills and access medical records online,” Gross says.

How do you choose your hospital? What digital tools are you using to make your health and wellness decisions?

Infographic via Google