Problem Statement
An effective model in health care exists where health care providers and patients engage in close partnerships. To support communication between various stakeholders, patients should be allowed to give feedback on the quality of services offered by clinics. This enables concerned parties to ascertain the satisfaction of health services offered to clients by clinics, hospitals and other health providers ( Jennings et al., 2017) . In addition, this helps in formulating effective health policies with patients’ experience being a key indicator of the effectiveness, safety, and quality of health care. This paper contains an analysis of a survey conducted to collect information from patients attending a health center to gauge client satisfaction, safety rating, service promptness, and staff responsiveness.
A questionnaire is developed and issued to randomly sampled patients so as to assess their experiences with outpatient and in-patient health care services offered in a low-income setting. A sample of 20 is considered in the study.
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Background
In order for health providers to offer services that match customer needs, organizations whose role is to provide or assess health care have to conduct customer appraisal. With the emergence of new medical technologies and an emphasis on the quality of services offered, hospitals and clinics have to uphold high levels of customer satisfaction so as to maintain a competitive edge. Customer satisfaction is a measure of how services and products are offered to meet customer needs and expectations ( Al ‐ Hamdan et al., 2017) . Customer satisfaction is regarded as one of the key indicators of performance within an organization or a business enterprise.
The health sector market has primarily changed over the years from focusing on the provider to focusing on the patient. As a result, any hospital, clinic or dispensary has to become service and client oriented so as to thrive in the current competitive market and satisfy their clients. The quality of service, the staff’s competency, respect, promptness of service delivery and communication are all key elements in a health facility. The interaction of patients with receptionists, nurses, doctors, billing staff and other personnel will determine whether the patient will visit the health facility in the future. The needs of the customers are best evaluated in their response towards pricing, handling by nurses and doctors, the waiting time before being attended to by medical staff and delivery of viable and appropriate services ( Wang, 2015).
Survey Questions
The research questions were as follows:
Do doctors and nurses treat with respect and courtesy?
Is the health facility environment clean and conducive?
Is the patient given sufficient information in an understandable manner in regard to signs, symptoms and health problems?
What is the waiting time in minutes before examination?
What is the overall cost of health care?
Background Information of the Respondents
The key characteristics and attributes of the respondents considered in the study were gender and age. Out of 20 respondents, 11 (55%) were female while 9 (45%) were male as illustrated in the table below.
| Gender | Frequency | Percentage |
| Female | 11 | 55% |
| Male | 9 | 45% |
Table 1
The respondents stated their ages as indicated in the table and histogram below.
| Age | Frequency | Percentage |
| Below 25 year | 3 | 15% |
| 26-35 years | 6 | 30% |
| 36-45 years | 5 | 25% |
| 46-55 year | 4 | 20% |
| Above 55 years | 2 | 10% |
Table 2
Graph 1
Do doctors and nurses treat patients with respect and courtesy?
The rating scale used in the questionnaire for this question was as follows.
Satisfied
Somewhat satisfied
Neutral
Somewhat dissatisfied
Dissatisfied
The feedback given by respondents was as illustrated in the table below.
| Feedback | Frequency |
| Satisfied | 7 |
| Somewhat satisfied | 8 |
| Neutral | 3 |
| Somewhat dissatisfied | 2 |
| Dissatisfied | 0 |
Table 3
The data indicated that the conduct of health staff in the facility was effective and according to Table 3, 7 clients (28%) were satisfied with respect and courtesy accorded to them by nurses and doctors, 8 clients (32%) were somehow satisfied, 3 clients(15%) were neutral, 2 were somehow dissatisfied while none of the clients was dissatisfied.
The bar graph for the response is shown below.
Graph 2
Waiting time in minutes before examination
The summary statistics for the waiting time before a client was attended to are shown in the table below.
|
waiting time: Descriptive statistics |
|
| Mean |
9.25 |
| Standard Error |
1.408387 |
| Median |
8 |
| Mode |
6 |
| Standard Deviation |
6.298496 |
| Sample Variance |
39.67105 |
| Kurtosis |
13.7711 |
| Skewness |
3.465076 |
| Range |
30 |
| Minimum |
4 |
| Maximum |
34 |
| Sum |
185 |
Table 4
The average waiting time is 9.25 minutes which indicates that patients are somehow satisfied except for emergency cases. The standard deviation is 6.3 minutes which shows a low variability in the waiting time by patients. There is an unexplained outlier in the data such as 34 minutes, therefore the health facility should improve on the promptness of service delivery.
Is the health facility environment clean and conducive?
The rating scale for this question was as follows.
Strongly agree
Agree
Neither agree or disagree
Disagree
The results for this parameter are shown in the table below.
| Feedback | Frequency |
| Strongly | 15 |
| Agree | 5 |
| Neither agree or disagree | 0 |
| Disagree | 0 |
Table 5
The data indicated that the environment of the health facility was clean and conducive according to clients’ responses. 15 clients (75%) strongly believed that the environment was clean while none of the clients was dissatisfied with the environment.
Cost of Health Care
The cost of health care primarily depends on the complexity of a health issue, medication, and the cost. The respondents indicated their level of satisfaction with the cost of service.
| Cost of service | Percentage |
| Low | 24% |
| Reasonable | 48% |
| High | 12% |
| Too high | 26% |
Table 6
According to Table 6, 24% of the respondents felt that the cost of service was low, 48% indicated it was reasonable, 12% said it was high while 26% suggested that it was too high.
The findings indicated that the cost of health was a source of dissatisfaction to the clients. The graph for the data is shown below.
Graph 3
Conclusion
Generally, client satisfaction for the health facility was upheld as clients were satisfied with the length of time in admitting patients. The study indicated that the communication between stakeholders was effective and this strengthened the relationship between patients and health staff. However, the cost of administering healthcare was found to be high and the facilities need to adjust this appropriately.
References
Al ‐ Hamdan, Z., Manojlovich, M., & Tanima, B. (2017). Jordanian nursing work environments, intent to stay, and job satisfaction. Journal of Nursing Scholarship , 49 (1), 103-110.
Jennings, N., Clifford, S., Fox, A. R., O’Connell, J., & Gardner, G. (2015). The impact of nurse practitioner services on cost, quality of care, satisfaction and waiting times in the emergency department: a systematic review. International journal of nursing studies , 52 (1), 421-435.
Wang, M. C., Mosen, D., Shuster, E., & Bellows, J. (2015). Association of patient-reported care coordination with patient satisfaction. The Journal of ambulatory care management , 38 (1), 69-76.
