(RAND Corp.: Santa Monica, CA) -- When looking for a new physician, patients are often encouraged to select those who are board-certified or who have not made payments on malpractice claims. Yet these characteristics are not always a good predictor of which physicians will provide the highest-quality medical care, according to a new study from the RAND Corp., a nonprofit research organization, and the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine.

“We found that the types of information widely available to patients for choosing a physician do not predict whether that physician will deliver evidence-based care,” says Rachel Reid, the study’s lead author and a medical student at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. “These findings underscore the need for better physician performance data to help consumers choose their doctor.”

Studying a large group of physicians over a two-year period, researchers found that three characteristics were associated with better quality medical care: being female, being board-certified, and graduating from a domestic medical school.

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