Within a clinic setting, the demographics of patients varies with state and national region. Depending on the physician, Nurse Practitioner and staff as well as the focus of the clinic, the patients' median age could be young, middle aged or elderly. Nationwide, as the population in the United States grows older, the average age being seen in a clinic setting according to the Robert Graham Center, “the youngest patients (0-4 years) and oldest patients (65-100 years) tend to visit primary care offices more frequently. The youngest age group averages approximately 2.5 visits per year; older age groups average 2.5 to 3 visits per year. Across all age groups, females have a higher mean number of primary care office visits (1.65) per year than males (1.44)”.
Brown et al found in their study, “approximately one third of patients were accompanied during visits to their doctors”. Of course, children and patients older than 75 were the higher proportion of this final number. The study found that most people were accompanied by a female who was between the ages of 21 and 40 years old. Interestingly, the study found the role of the person accompanying the patient was that of an advocate for the patient and the influence of the person who was accompanying the patient was generally seen as “positive”.
How do different generations of patients view the interior of a health clinic? Let’s start with millennials. Millennials are people born between 1981 and 1996. These people grew up around the internet and are used to having 24/7 access to information. According to Forbes Magazine, “6 out of 10 of millennials support telemedicine, such as video chats, instead of in-person visits. Even more want their doctor to give them a mobile app for booking appointments, reviewing health records and managing their preventive care”. Many times, these aged patients would not want to visit the brick and mortar clinic. They would prefer to be seen by the healthcare provider by tele-medicine. So technically, the healthcare provider sitting at a desk on a video screen would be all the patient would see while chatting.
A second group of people who will visit the clinic would be those ages 65 and older. This generation of patients would typically make an appointment with the healthcare provider and be seen within the brick and mortar clinic. They would not normally take advantage of the tele-medicine option. As interior spaces would go, the furniture would need to be comfortable and higher off the ground to accommodate the ability to rise and sit easily. The hallways would need to be well lighted and the flooring would need to be non-slippery to aid in their possible unsteady gait. The hallways and doorways would need to be wide enough to accommodate walkers and wheelchairs. The clinic rooms would need easy to open door handles as well as natural lighting. Many of these older patients are not as comfortable as millennials in using the clinic’s patient portal or electronic health records. They typically would want access to their test results through a phone call from the trusted healthcare provider.
A third group of people who would access health care in a clinic setting would be the “working age”. This group is normally age 20 – 60. In many cases, people in this age range have employer sponsored health insurance so the options might possibly be limited. The desire for a clean and sanitary interior space of the health clinic would be possibly be number one on many working age persons. Many times, they would not want to miss much work so they would not want to come to a clinic for a cold and wind up with another infection that would leave them sick for several weeks, missing more work than they had intended. The interior of the clinic would need to be well-lit and comfortable. The process of getting in an out quickly would need to prime. The signage would need to clean and explicit, maximizing their time to the fullest. It would be beneficial if a pharmacy and lab/radiology would be on site at the clinic so they can take care of all the aspects of healthcare in one place. This would minimize the need for several trips in order to meet their healthcare needs.
In a clinic setting, there are delays in getting results back to the healthcare provider. Many times, the lab samples must be sent off site for resulting. But in this age of technology, results can be faxed, emailed or phoned to the provider. During the wait for these results, however, the healthcare provider would continue treating the other patients that are in the clinic. In cases where the results might take several days to gain results, the health care providers would send the patients home with the promise to call as soon as the results have been received in the clinic. Of course, the healthcare providers would assure the safety of the patients before sending them home.
REFERENCES
Brown, J. B., Brett, P., Stewart, M., & Marshall, J. N. (1998). Roles and influence of people who accompany patients on visits to the doctor. Canadian family physician Medecin de famille canadien.
Panner, Morris. (April 2019). Five Ways Millennials Do Health Care Their Own Way
Petterson S, McNellis R, Klink K, Meyers D, Bazemore A. (January 2018). The State of Primary Care in the United States: A Chartbook of Facts and Statistics.
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