Physician in the family.

Cox 10000%.

Why’s that?

OP asked for physicians' opinions. I gave the one I know.

Every time this turns into a debate about "why", though, it just breaks down along religious lines with both sides whining about anecdotes vs evidence.

If I'm like "Mercy has a bunch of religious policies", people are like "no, but my doctor is great and I had a great outcome" or "yeah, they're assholes, and I almost died".

If I'm like "Cox feels impersonal and cold", people are like "no, but my doctor is great and I had a great outcome" or "yeah, they're assholes, and I almost died".

There's no point.

EDIT: to be clear, I don't think they're equivalent. Just that the argument here gets pretty silly.

Depends entirely on the procedures needed, but in general, Cox.

I've worked for both but I'll give some brief bits of my experience.

Mercy:

Constantly laying off entire departments or outsourcing, they may not offer some services at all.

Religious institution and are beholden to catholic values in a politicized environment, even less likely to offer some services.

Most doctors I spoke with my time there were rather... obnoxious or pretentious, very 1% "im better than you" vibes.

Cox:

If there is a service needed, they likely have it and offer it.

Doctors are still split and youll get the pretentious types, but they usually have decent bedside manner, they just treat coworkers bad.

Billing department is kind of a mess at times. If there is a billing issue, you have to be on top of it to get it fixed. (i work in a front facing role, but have nothing to do with backend and I have no idea what mercy is like)

Cox hands down. I've used both and the Dr's and general staff at Cox are helpful and generally have great bedside manner. Likely because they treat their employees better.

I'm a caseworker for adults and go to many doctors appointments. I have to say Cox hands down. I've felt like they've provided better care, and their services are way more reliable. I've run into many issues with Mercy screwing up appointments, rescheduling without contacting me or my clients, and I have been less happy with Mercy providers overall (not that there aren't good ones).

I've had these same issues with Cox, but much less frequently. Most of my clients prefer Cox over Mercy.

I've also been very disappointed by Mercy's Marian Center, and would strongly recommend going to Cox North over Mercy for psychiatric hospitalizations (also recommend Burrell's Rapid Access Center before letting the crisis escalate to requiring hospitalization). God forbid the Marian Center is full and they send you off to the rundown overflow facility in Joplin.... Haven't gone out there in years, but that place was a shithole last I was.

Nowhere is perfect, but Mercy is much farther from reaching that mark than Cox in my opinion. I go to Cox over Mercy for all of my providers.

The thing about comparing anecdotes between Cox and Mercy is that the negative anecdotes for Mercy far outnumber the negative anecdotes for Cox.

I've also heard nothing but bad things regarding employee treatment and work culture at Mercy from people who've worked there. I've also had more problems with Mercy in regard to my line of work as a caseworker.

I'd love to see some independent metrics on both employee and consumer satisfaction between Cox and Mercy.

While Cox doesn’t check the layoff box, they also have outsourced entire departments.

Yep. I agree with you completely. I didn't mean to make it sound like they were actually equivalent. I was just explaining why I'm not personally very interested in "debating" it.

I've worked for both companies and both have great physicians and room for improvement. I'm thankful that my insurance considers both in network. Mercy has better rehabilitation services following an illness (stroke, car wreck, brain injury). I don't love my Mercy primary care dr though and am looking to switch to Cox but my children's Mercy pediatrician is the best ped in Springfield. I also absolutly love my Mercy OBGYN. However we've had better luck at Cox Urgent Care (The Turner Center) for kids and adults vs Mercy urgent care.

I didn't really answer your question (sorry) but I agree with the above - people in Springfield are usually passionate about which health system they prefer.

If you are lucky enough that your insurance covers both systems then don't be afraid to mix and match.

Honestly, the only one i can think of is the IT department. Most everything else has a clinic for it, is in house, or they have a partnership.

Regardless, if they are doing that, its not to the extent that Mercy does.

Oh yeah I understood what you meant. That was just my two cents..