Dr. George Till, State Representative (D-Jericho) is back with another online Physician Survey on legislative issues related to health care. You may recall the foofaraw over his 2011 survey and its breathlessly reported topline: IF WE PASS SINGLE-PAYER, ONE-QUARTER OF VERMONT’S DOCTORS WILL LEAVE THE STATE!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!
(Caps and italics mine. And exclamation marks.)
There were some problems, reported here at GMD if not elsewhere, that meant the survey was highly unreliable. Licensed physicians were notified of the survey by postcard, but anyone could go online and fill it out. Notification was only as reliable as Dr. Till’s mailing list. It was possible to fill out the survey more than once. The survey was unscientific; it wasn’t a true sampling of physician opinion, but a voluntary online poll of those motivated to fill it out. (36% of licensed physicians completed the survey.) Also, the “licensed physician” category includes a whole lot of people who are retired, have left medical practice, live in neighboring states but are licensed in Vermont, and have moved away but maintained their Vermont license.
(Many doctors maintain licenses in multiple states. Non-practicing doctors often keep their licensing current in case they decide to go back to medicine. Renewing an existing license is far simpler than re-applying.)
After the jump: slightly more secure, but still fundamentally flawed. Also, apes.
Well, Dr. Till has a new, improved, secure survey for 2012. As he noted in his postcard to physicians:
Because last years (sic) survey was contaminated by certain advocates and non physicians, your license number will be required to complete the survey.
Contaminated! “Take your filthy paws off my survey, you damn dirty ape!” Funny, that word “contaminated” rings a bell… From a comment posted on GMD April 12, 2011, about a week after Till’s first survey was released:
Rep. Till addressed the Democratic caucus today concerning the brouhaha with his survey. Basically, he was angry with the fact that the survey had been tainted by “contaminants”. He referred to the fact that some members of the caucus had accessed it, as well as maybe some others in the building.
At least some of those damn dirty apes were, as he himself noted, fellow members of his party caucus. Must have been an uncomfortable moment.
This time, in order to access the online survey, you have to enter your license number and specialty. I’m sure there are ways to hack it, but it should at least keep out the casual non-physician and cut down on specious responses.
However, all the other problems remain. This will not be a scientific survey because the responders are self-selecting. Till’s mailing list may or may not be comprehensive. Nonresidents, and nonpracticing physician, are still eligible to respond if they have Vermont licenses. We don’t know what will happen if a physician tries to take the survey more than once; will the survey reject a license number if it’s entered multiple times? (For instance, that semiretired orthopod in Rutland who’s a frequent guest on “Common Sense Radio” bashing HCR. He’s motivated, and he’s got time on his hands.)
Remember all of this in a few weeks, when Dr. Till holds a news conference and the Vermont media report this as a meaningful reflection of physician opinion.
‘Tisn’t.
p.s. If any of you damn dirty apes out there do manage to hack the survey, we’d like to hear. I’m especially interested in finding out which questions are asked and how they’re worded.
But if you have google skills, you can find VT physician license numbers on the web, and you can find their specialties.
If he wants an honest survey, he should hire an agency that does it professionally, and will survey licensed physicians, selected randomly from the list kept by the Secretary of State’s office, and will verify the current state in which the physician practices.
For example, someone who has retired to Florida, but is still licensed in VT is not a valid respondent.
if he vetted this survey methodology with our state auditor? He’s got that whole ‘accounting for me and you’ thing going on….
This is sort of the equivalent of a tenth grader doing an anonymous “survey” of his classmates to determine whether everybody’s grade should be raised.
Why does anyone care what George Till has to say about this? He’s clearly got an agenda and has demonstrated a historical willingness to distort information in order to push that agenda.
he really wanted scientific results this type of survey would not have been repeated. There is really only one conclusion-he doesn’t. Appears to be banking on pulling the wool over the eyes of a clueless constituency & gullible public to make his dubious claims. Certainly by now lawmakers are onto this.
Nonplussed to say the least as VT mainstream & legacy media reported the survey as if it were fact. Not one journalist (that I know of) did their due diligence & questioned the format as well as the unscientific methodology with the exception of the AP. When a*s was nailed to the wall, he claimed survey was ‘hacked’ & faulted legislators who took the survey (who did so to prove anyone could take it).
Difficult to believe he would repeat the performance.