Younger Physicians Are More Likely to Use Smartphones and Tablets for Work Reasons
Almost all physicians under the age 35 (95%) use a smartphone for professional purposes, according to the Sources & Interactions Study, September 2014 – Medical/Surgical Edition. Older physicians are far less likely to use both smartphones and tablets devices for work; 64% of physicians over the age of 60 use smartphones and 48% use tablets. But overall, these numbers continue to increase over time.
Younger physicians (under the age of 35) are also much more likely to use medical apps on smartphones than their older counterparts, with 92% reporting that they use at least one kind of smartphone app for professional purposes. 88% use a smartphone app for diagnostic tools/clinical reference and 76% use apps for drug and coding references. When we look at doctors ages 35-44, those percentages drop to 69% and 62% respectively. Further, the study found that those percentages drop more significantly for doctors ages 45-59: 55% use the former and 46% use the latter.
Tablet apps show a different story. Age isn’t as much of a factor in whether or not the physician is using a tablet app for professional purposes. 60% of doctors under 35 use a tablet app for work reasons while 53% of doctors ages 35-44 do so. 40% of doctors over 60 use tablet apps.
The Sources & Interactions™ Study is a detailed examination of doctors’ online and mobile activities, e-detailing experience, and exposure to (and evaluation of) information sources including traditional and emerging media, pharma reps, CME, convention and more. The study is conducted every six months and targets more than 3,000 physicians annually across 22 specialties, exploring their media preferences and habits. Sources & Interactions was designed to help marketers and their agencies cost-effectively allocate resources to their overall promotional mix, and provide publishers with specific insight about where their offerings fit into physicians (and other healthcare professionals’) information inventory.
To find out more about the study and get access to specialty-specific data, contact us now. We study physician media behaviors and preferences annually across 22 specialties.
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