Dr. Gurley is chosen by Best Doctors survey for 2014-2015 and 2015-2016

Doctors that Other Doctors Choose

The Best Doctors database is based on an exhaustive, peer-review-based evaluation of the medical profession in which we contact about 50,000 doctors who have been identified in our previous surveys as “the best” in their specialties and ask them: “If you or a loved one needed a doctor in your specialty, and you could not treat them yourself, to whom would you refer them?” Even though we use extensive proprietary polling and balloting software on an exhaustive scale, our survey is designed to mimic the informal, peer-to-peer referral process that doctors themselves use to determine the appropriate specialists for individual cases. The difference is that we bring together the insights and experience of tens of thousands of leading specialists and cover over 400 subspecialties of medicine.

Every doctor contacted is given the opportunity both to comment (confidentially) on the other doctors listed in his or her specialty, and to make additional nominations. As new names are added to the pool, each undergoes the same rigorous peer-evaluation process.

The result is a constant refinement of both the voting pool and the nominee pool. Each time a survey is conducted, the list is sifted, refined, and improved, resulting in better representation and more solid consensus. The broadness and depth of the voting pool help eliminate the biases and cronyism that often mar smaller-scale surveys. Finally, in-depth surveying of this type allows Best Doctors to develop detailed profiles of each of the doctors in its database (e.g. hospital affilliations, in-office language skills, special areas of research and/or experience).

Our most recent survey of the medical profession involved more than 1 million individual evaluations. Best Doctors employs a combination of high-technology surveying methods and person-to-person phone interviews which permit more detailed questions regarding a physician’s practice and encourage more open and candid responses.

Doctors who are nominated because of their membership in an informal “referral loop” are subjected to the unbiased votes of scores of doctors not in the loop.

Because all voting is strictly confidential, voters are not subject to the institutional, professional, or community pressures that often influence individual referrals.

We are Completely Independent.

Doctors are not asked for and do not ever pay any fees for inclusion as a Best Doctors Physician. Doctors are not notified of their inclusion until after the survey process is completed.

Every one of the physicians included in The Best Doctors database are certified or subcertified through the American Board of Medical Specialties.