For patients, navigating the medical system is a struggle — even
when they are relatively well. It’s worse when they’re sick,
such as patients with complex medical problems requiring urgent
attention, like work-ups for cancer. Simply trying to coordinate
appointments between specialists can be incredibly frustrating
and time-consuming. And because specialists often work in
individual silos, they don’t communicate with one another,
leaving hapless patients and their families to shuffle
themselves and their reams of information from one specialist to
the next. A recent survey commissioned by ZocDoc, which is
trying to apply an OpenTable-style online scheduling model to
health care, found that young adults are especially frustrated
with the current health-care infrastructure. More than half of
2,000 18-to-34-year-olds surveyed said they delayed getting
medical care because the process is a “pain.” More than 60% of
these tech-savvy Gen Yers — who are accustomed to scheduling
their lives with the touch of a screen