Doctors may often be referred to as busy and constantly on the go, but they are still choosing stationary desktops to perform professional activities. In an August 2013 study by Kantar Media Healthcare Research, physicians preferred a computer over a smartphone or tablet when conducting all tasks listed in the survey, from accessing the internet to reading articles and abstracts.
The most common digital activity among US physicians in the survey was accessing the internet, at 97%. More than 90% of respondents said they conducted this task on a desktop, compared with 67% and 48% who did so on a smartphone or tablet, respectively. No. 2 email saw similar percentages for each device.
When it came to reading medical publications and abstracts, print beat out both smartphones and tablets. More than half of physicians said they read articles from medical publications in physical form, compared with 21% who cited smartphones and 28% for tablets. But this wasn’t due to a dislike for reading on screens: Around three-quarters of respondents said they read articles on a desktop.
Mobile or not, Kantar Media Healthcare Research found that physicians were using digital channels frequently, with four in 10 accessing the web more than four times per day. Time spent during each internet session suggested that they weren’t spending too much time sitting in front of the computer: 63% of respondents said they spent just 1 to 15 minutes each time they went online, likely due to their busy schedules.
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