The trend: Nearly one-quarter of patients (24%) who are pleased with the quality of their recent medical care may still change doctors in the next 6 months, according to a new survey from Huron Consulting Group.

Digging into the data: Many consumers say they’re considering switching physicians, primarily due to factors such as accessibility, availability, and high costs.

Access and availability. Respondents cite long wait times for appointments (29%) and limited appointment availability that fits their schedule (22%) as top barriers to receiving care. Another 14% noted transportation issues. Consequently, the top reasons for switching providers are due to a more convenient location (39%) and better appointment availability (31%).

Pricing. High out-of-pocket costs ranked as the third-highest barrier (21%) to getting care. Meanwhile, 23% said that an affordable and transparent billing process would drive them to switch providers.

What’s at stake: Losing patients can be quite costly for medical clinics, particularly smaller practices that operate on tighter margins than bigger health systems.

• Research has shown that it's 5x to 25x more expensive to acquire a new patient than it is to keep an existing one.
• Additional challenges can occur for a practice if a person leaves for a better medical care experience and tells others about it, potentially deterring new patients and referrals.

Our take: People used to have limited options for healthcare and just went with whatever was in their insurance network. But things are changing, and providers can no longer bet on this.

With many health plans now offering less coverage and more people having high-deductible plans, healthcare has become more expensive. This has led to a new era of direct-to-consumer (D2C) healthcare. Now, some people are even willing to pay out of pocket for popular treatments like weight-loss drugs or for personalized, "concierge-style" medical care from companies like One Medical and Hims & Hers.

To compete with these tech-savvy healthcare companies, traditional clinics and health systems need to adapt. While they may not be able to match them completely, they should at least adopt some of the features that patients want.

This includes offering things like:

• Access to doctors via text or apps
• Online scheduling for same-day appointments
• Upfront cost estimates

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