Consumer Reports gave Montana poor marks for not using simple language to get more information about doctors.
Lisa McGiffert is the Director of Consumer Reports' Safe Patient Project. Her complaint is with terminology on the Montana Board of Medical Examiner website.
“The terms on that page are licensee search as opposed to something real simple like find your doctor or look up your doctor,” said McGiffert.
Consumer Reports reviewed medical board websites in all 50 states.
She does give the Montana website high marks for plain language on the complaint process and frequently asked questions. And she liked the link to legal documents.
Ian Marquand is the executive officer for the Montana Board of Medical Examiners. He says Montana got good ratings from Consumer Report’s project on search capabilities, the complaint process and for identifying the information about doctors. He said,” that tells me that individuals…citizens…anybody that wants to look up a physician, that Montana does that pretty well.”
The Consumers Reports urges Montana and all other state medical boards to adopt a number of reforms. This includes plain language summary of any disciplinary actions taken by the boards.
The review of the medical websites is in latest issue of Consumer Reports.
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