Comparing the Patient Satisfaction Survey Results on Care Provision in the NHS Hospitals - Literature review Example

Comparing the Patient Satisfaction Survey Results on Care Provision in the National Health Service Hospitals to Private and Community Care Satisfaction Outcomes from Patients a Literature Review Name Institution Comparing the Patient Satisfaction Survey Results on Care Provision in the National Health Service Hospitals to Private and Community Care Satisfaction Outcomes from Patients a Literature Review Introduction Patient satisfaction is one of the most important aspects in caring for the patients in in order to come up with the best nursing practices either at home or in the national facilities and hospitals. Patients’ satisfaction, in itself, is a multifaceted concept which is difficult to define (Spath, 2013). Broadly speaking, it can be said to be the extent to which the care the patients receives meets their expectations. Patients’ satisfaction is important because it has been linked to the level of outcomes such as how faster a patient gets better and whether the patient becomes loyal to the facility. On the other hand, it is difficult to measure and it may be affected by attitudes and other psychological factors, which means that what a physician think is the best care, may in fact be perceived differently by the patient receiving such care. The aim of this study is to compare the level of care that is administered in the national hospitals and that of privately and community run care comparing the level of satisfaction that the patients accrue from the two forms of care. This is important due to the fact that the two institutions are different in the manner in which they are managed. Besides, due to difference in cost, national hospitals appear to attract more patients than private hospitals and this is also likely to affect satisfaction levels. The study looks and examines the best practice and method for administering care among the patients and the preferred method with the reasons for the method critically examined. To achieve the objectives of this research, a wide raging data in this area will be collected from available electronic sources. Basically this involves visiting the various websites of the health facilities and looking for information in the subject of satisfaction. This approach is easier to use as there are many databases on the subject available. Basically, the research will be looking at reported data on the subject by the various organisations. However, the study will be inconclusive as we are not able to look at the psychological aspect of the patient. As noted earlier, psychological factors have a role in determining the satisfaction a patient derives from a given institution of healthcare. However, we can only deduce that if it is reported that patients have a higher satisfaction level at a given facility, this goes beyond the care and relationship with physicians to also include their own perceptions and attitudes towards the level of care and physicians. One of the themes that emerge from the research is the different levels of care and how they relate to individual patients may it be in the National Hospitals or at the private facilities. There is also an attitude and perceptive behaviour among patients to a given level of care since the patients perceive the levels of care differently. The research conducted to determine the level of care between different patients in different facilities and also shows the mode of nursing care that is administered to the patients. There is a difference in the perception and attitude by the patients between the two forms of care since although the level of qualifications and methods applied by the different institutions and nurses is similar (Larssen et al, 2009). The research is essential to the field of nursing since the nurses are able to identify the different methods of care that are administered by the patients and critically examine the difference between the methods of care. After understanding the values of care that the patients place on the different nursing practices used by nurses they are able to critically generate the best methods and mechanisms of care. Besides, results of satisfaction surveys will determine the extent to which patients become loyal to a facility hence guaranteeing profitability of the facility and protecting it from intense competition and price wars. Above all, it helps avoid malpractices as nurses know they will be found out through customer feedbacks and therefore help check their behaviour. All in all, satisfaction surveys are important in the nursing industry and have been widely adopted. In recent times, the focus is shifting from collecting information, to ensuring information collected is accurate and response rates high, so as to base policies on the same feedbacks (Spath, 2013). Background Nursing requires caring for the patient constantly and coming up with new methods or improving the existing techniques to meet this goal. It is therefore important for continuous improvement of quality and safety in the provision of patient care among the nurses (Hall, 2006). There is a constant advocacy for a change in the existing measures of using the methods that have been previously implemented to changing the methods to include constant improvement of the methods in the clinical practices through engagement practices of multiple monitoring and improvement strategies that have been implemented (Gordon, 2005). The patients are the main sources of data that is essential to the development of the best methods that are important in improving the dignity and respect with which the patients are treated. The data collected and analysed from the patients and their family members give the best methods that can essentially contribute to clinical improvement and the improvement in the level of care by the nurses. The patients’ information is also useful in identifying problems and structuring necessary improvements that are required by the nursing care to improve the level of care within the different clinics (Matzo and Sherman, 2011). The purpose of this report therefore is to identify and review the literature that examines patient satisfaction and complaints within the national care and the private and community care to come up with the best methods in order to improve the level of care. Definition of Patient Satisfaction and Patient Complaints The patient satisfaction and patient complaints data is used first to evaluate patient care and also to predict patient behaviour to the different methods that have been implemented and drawn in nursing. These two factors ensure that there is a proper structure in place that has evaluated the different methods and has come up with the recommendation of a health care service for the return in future. Since the research conducted involves identifying and predicting consumer behaviour for the future the data that is used in this research is not addressed in the current report. The patient complaints have also been confined to the reports on the level of care that they has been administers and not the drugs or treatment methods in order to help with the goals and objectives of the research. It is important to note that there is no universally accepted definition of patient satisfaction but there are dimensions that are used to measure the quality of care and the level of satisfaction that the patients have accrued from the care that include: technical quality of care, accessibility and convenience, finances, art of care that is the caring attitude, physical availability of the care giver, continuity of care, efficacy and outcome of care by the care giver among other measures that are used in coming up with the best methods that are essential in ensuring that the patient needs are properly met by the healthcare provider. Method used in Searching data When undertaking the research there were different terms that were highlighted in order to come up with the best information on patient satisfaction and patient complaint in using academic sources and literature databases to research the different terms and research items in the research. When the research was first conducted incorporating the terms patient satisfaction and patient complaints there were a series of many irrelevant sources and references that were related to the symptoms and the medical effects of different drugs and also treatment methods and not on the level of care that was important in this research. However, after some time using the brainstorming technique and preliminary scoping of literature the search items and the limiters and academic databases were significantly changed and better search items were later drafted that were inclusive and essential in ensuring that the research reached its set objectives. The terms that were used in the literature search on the database included; Customer satisfaction quality assurance Patient satisfaction quality indicators of healthcare Patient grievance Quality control Patient care from home National hospitals caring systems Reviews of the level of care by patients Patient complaints Quality of care Quality management The search process The search process involved a search that involved the search of electronic academic literature databases and also the snowball technique of citation tracking. While conducting the electronic searches there were a few attempts that were unsuccessful in their search items and did not give the required results. However, after the trial and error method the electronic academic health literature databases that is; the Medline and Medline In-Process and Non Indexed citations on medicine literature, Biomedical and Pharmaceutical Literature and Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature were searched against the aforementioned terms and it gave preferable results for the research. The truncation method enabled the research to use terms suffixes and also plurals in the search to come up with different definitions and also different aspects of the terms researched. There was also the use of Boolean terms such as ‘AND’ and ‘OR’ to identify the references in which the combined definitions of search terms occurred for instance “patient” and “Complaints”. The snowball and citation tracking technique involved searching for references identified through other literature but not by the systematic search of academic literature databases. The references were also downloaded into Endnote for later analysis. The review process of the materials that were collected involved was divided into five phases with the initial phase being the review of the parameters that had been identified which were in accordance with the Statewide Quality Branch. In the second phase the search for the literature that is essential in this research that is the customer satisfaction and customer complaint was done. In this phase the electronic searches and also the snowball techniques and citation tracking were conducted. The third phase involved the screening of the literature for relevant sources (Newhouse and Poe, 2005). Under this phase the references that were solely concerned with the complaints and the satisfaction were considered with the litigation and the different specific treatment and irrelevant references that were not pertinent to the review was excluded. In the fourth phase the literature was reviewed and the measurement for patient satisfaction and patient complaints in relation to quality improvement of the systems in care was conducted (Pincus et al, 2013). The selected information was subjected to data mining and reviewed then the findings were analysed in phase five and the report was written in phase six. Even though over 100 electronic sources were searched, there were a number of limitations encountered. For once, some sources were simply inadequate to address the topic of satisfaction. There were 43 sources that were simply left out because they dealt with steps that can be taken to improve satisfaction levels and the importance of patient satisfaction but did not go far enough to give the situation at various facilities. Besides this, there was also a problem with regards to various parameter used to measure satisfaction thus posing a challenge with regards to comparing satisfaction rates. To this end, the researcher estimated what those satisfaction rates are. Review of the Literature Patient satisfaction and patient complaints are important for clinicians and o come up and develop different methods that may help the hospitals in coming up with better methods that are essential in ensuring proper quality of care for the patients either at home or in the hospitals. There are different research that have been conducted by researchers in different facilities to measure the quality of care to different patients in different age groups and with different conditions to identify the best methods that are essential in coming up with methods that may help the patients in accessing better care (Graban, 2009). This part of the literature review assesses the different forms of research and highlights the conclusions made under each research to surmount the importance of better care to all patients regardless of their age or illness and the levels of satisfaction that the patients derive from the different methods of care administered (Swift, 2002). This part divides the different researches that are related to a single aspect in the quality of care and patient satisfaction and give a structured conclusion of the method that have been implemented and the conclusions made by the researchers. One of the things that were evident in the research of the literature is the need to find the appropriate tools to conduct a research and come up with the best results for the research. According to Grifith (2009), the form of research conducted is determined by the tools that have been used in coming up with the information that is used in the process. There is a need for a tool to measure the client experience of person-centred care that is required to complement the existing measures of quality. When developing the best tools to come up with a method to measure the client experience the researcher used clients that had been recently discharged from a sub-acute setting. In getting the information on the satisfaction and quality of care that is offered in a given facility interviewing and taking data from patients that had been previously admitted in the hospitals for sub-acute conditions is the best way to get the required information (Giles, 2007). The information collected on these patients is evident of the quality of care administered. There is a need to use the level of care from a randomly collected sample that is however inclusive of all ages and in different illnesses to ensure that the method is helpful in collecting the information. After the conclusion of the test there were a higher percentage of people that gave satisfactory statements of the quality of care in comparison to the number of complaints (Williams, 2004). While it is true that many hospitals will want to focus on previously admitted patients to participate in their surveys, Hall (2006) is of the view that this should be expanded to to include all those who seek services in a hospital. According to Hall (2006), focusing on a small segment of patients is more informed by economic reasons rather than objectivity. Thus leaving out certain segments may compromise the level of service certain group of patients receive at a hospital. However, it can also be said that patients who have spent some time at the hospital have greater levels of interaction and are more informed about a hospitals operations, thus able to be more objective than outpatients. According to the research conducted one of the key areas that was highly commended was the level of professionalism and the nursing care that was given to the patients while at the hospital (Gordon, 2005). They were also commending the level of engagement and proper attitude as depicted by the nurses while conducting their work. However, when asked on the level of attachment and the emotional aspect that was shown to them at the hospitals there was a clear indication of preferring to be treated at a private institution rather than the national institutions. It is difficult to say why this is the case, but one reason may relate to ownership. National hospitals are owned by the federal governments and thus tends to suffer from bureaucracy, which extend even to the affect the quality of service patients get rom such facilities due to poor staff morale and loopholes that may encourage unprofessional behaviour. According to Giles (2007), the level of emotional attachment that is shown by a nurse can only go that far since although the patient may want more attachment and care there is also the fact that the nurses are also affected by the situations and illnesses of their patients and the emotional attachment can only make the situation worse. It is within the nurses’ DNA to ensure that they do not get too attached to their patient so that they can be able to administer and perform their roles sufficiently. It is important therefore that the patients understand the reaction by their nurses and not to expect a high level of attachment since although it may be a good for the patients it affects the nurses differently. Fotler et al (2002),assert that the number of patients that the nurses serve in a given day or a year and it is therefore impossible for the nurses to create an emotional attachment with each employee in this respect. However, the national hospitals having a higher number of patients are more affected by lack of emotional attachment as a single nurse is assigned to more than a dozen patients in a day a factor that makes it incredibly difficult to associate with each patient (Pincus et al, 2013). According to Donabadien (2008), however, hospitals are increasingly using this aspect of attachment between the patient and the nurse to show a greater level of care and also ensure patient satisfaction thereby increasing the number of positive comments about their facilities. Although this is not possible for the public facilities due to the number of patients the private facilities have used this platform and have changed their facilities in terms of the number of patients that visit and are recommended to receive care in these facilities (Gordon, 2009). The nurses are dedicated to a few patients and the patients are thereby able to identify with the nurses through sharing different aspects and information about their lives. When the patients relate with the nurses they see them as better caregivers and satisfy the patients. In most cases the people that require home or hospitalised care are old people since they develop conditions that due to their age have to be properly monitored and checked to ensure that they age gracefully (Pincus et al, 2013). A research on the quality of care that is administered to old people is therefore essential to understand the development in strategies by the nurses that need to be done either in their homes or within the national hospitals. Apart from children old patients are the most sensitive and therefore require a high level of monitoring and care. A research conducted on the quality of care administered to old people on two hospitals showed that the patients were graceful and appreciative of the satisfactory treatment that they received from the patients (Matzo & Sherman, 2011). In old age according to Cohn and Huogh (2008), patients are able to appreciate the efforts made by others and view the different methods implemented to ensure their safety as a favour and not an obligation for the care givers. The old patients are therefore more appreciative of the different methods that the nurses apply to their advantage and very thankful since the processes and procedures implemented are professional and well managed by the nurses (Donaldson, 2009). They are also encouraged by the number of people that they interact and associate with in the while at the hospital and as a result they are very satisfied. Another study conducted in a home for the aged revealed the immense appreciation and commending comments that came from the members of the homes (Hall, 2006). Since majority of them are taken to the homes for their own safety and also to ensure that they get professional treatment that they cannot get at home they see the opportunity as a good platform for their health. Top on their list is the level of communication and activities that they are able to engage in while in the institutions (Donaldson, 2009). They are also able to be taken through programs that are essential in developing attributes and strengths that are important to the patients and their overall development. However, there are those members that are critical of the homes and view them as a way for their families to forsake them citing the lack of visitations and other problems that are common among the homes for the aged (Simons et al, 2013). The percentage is however small and as a result having the best methods for the population is very high for the old people since they appreciate the services given. In managing the quality of pain management however among the old people there is a different in the analysis and reports that are collected by the researchers on old people (Simons et al, 2013). Since some of the patients have chronic illnesses pain management is one of the care requirements that needs to be properly assessed by the care givers and should be properly conducted to ensure that the parents are satisfied and can draw from the corm of care given (Hewitt and Simone, 2009). Reports show that in the National hospital facilities where the number of patients allocated to a single nurse are too high it is more difficult for the patients with the chronic problems or with persistent pain to gain access to the best method of pain management that are available. The nurses need to take into consideration the sensitivity of the old people and give them top-notch services that are helpful to their aging bodies. There is a need for different methods to be developed and a higher level of care shown to the patients in this regard in order to ensure that the patients are satisfied with the level of care that is given to the patients (Simons et al, 2013). In regards to care giving among patients under private and community care the level of care is much better as the patients are well monitored and any changes handled immediately to ensure that the patient is comfortable and the methods for care are satisfactory. In assessing the outpatient services that are offered in the National hospitals in comparison to the private and community care there is a difference in the quality between the two. On one hand the private care is rated to be better since the outpatient care in these facilities are lower in comparison to the numbers that are evident in the National hospitals. On the other hand the number of nurses and doctors in the national hospitals has too many patients to give a substantial level of care for the patients. The outpatient care is critical parts of care since majority of the patients that visit the hospital do not have serious conditions that might necessitate admission to the hospital. This therefore makes the level of care that is administered to the patients as outpatients important and therefore making it an important assessment for the patients (Spath, 2013). Patients need to gain the level of confidence and assess the care highly in order to ensure that the number of patients that reach out to the facility’s care is very high since if the patients rate the facilities highly they are likely to go in case of more serious problems (Harker and Culica, 2007). The quality of care starts with the fundamental aspects that may be identified through assessing the perceptions of patients, in the different levels of care that patients are given once they go to hospital for outpatient services. The information on the different levels of care in the national hospitals and also in the private and community care needs to be properly assessed through collecting different sets of data that is available through the electronic database and the tracking of different citations. Once the data is compared through the different methods there is a need to have a working structure that helps in developing a proper mechanism to ensure that the set of data is properly recorded, analysed and the findings are discussed in length further in the research process. Findings The literature has highlighted some of the key concepts that are important within the research and the themes in the reviewed literature overlap. One of the most important themes that come out of this research is that of care. The main theme that is researched is care that is offered by the clinicians and nurses in their respective jobs and how it relates to either the national hospitals or the private and community centres (Sitzia and Wood, 1997). The quality of care is key in determining satisfaction levels a patient derives from a given facility. Care can be seen in the context of the relationship between the patient and the nurse or clinician and whether the patient feels loved (Matzo & Sherman, 2011). In my opinion, it is the responsibility if the hospitals to work out what forms of care each patient requires and how best to achieve those levels without compromising the quality of service. These are also fundamental aspects that relate to the quality of care to the people that refer to the services of the hospital. The concept of quality is however linked to the concept of health that is also linked to other qualities such as research, measures and surveys (Hall, 2006). In nursing practice, quality can be seen as the level to which the expectation of the patients’ are met. To this end, satisfaction levels of the patient is looked at from the perception of the patient and not the hospital. The problem with this dimension is however affected by cost considerations (Williams, 2004). It is thus difficult to balance between the two interests and a hospital with lower satisfaction score may not necessarily offering poor services. The level of care is a concept that is associated with the level of care and experience that is related to improvement of measure and surveys of use for the people and how the concept relates to the different people and their conceptual frameworks that are important in the level of care offered by the nurses. It is important for the nurses to ensure that they have analysed and implemented the best techniques and platforms that ensure the highest quality and satisfaction for the patients in a given facility or hospital (Harker and Culica, 2007). This is made possible by first trying to find out what customers expect or the issues at the facility that puts them off. With this information, tailoring of the services at the facility to meet the needs of the customers who are the patient can be undertaken. To get this information, the hospital will first have to come up with a better way of collecting data from the patients. The response rate is something that may determine the effectiveness of the process. Williams (2004), notes that it is a myth to assume that only dissatisfied patients or those who are very happy tends to respond to such surveys. In essence, the problem will be with the validity of the questions. Thus, if the wrong questions are asked, answers may not be of much help. The theme patients on the other hand overlap with different concepts such as study and questionnaire that have been used in conducting the research. In nursing practice, it is critical that the hospitals first decide if it is necessary for all patients to participate in a nursing survey or restrict it to one or two segments of groups. Besides, there is the issue of which kinds of questions to ask. They should be questions that elicit specific responses. Above all, the cost of analysing the responses should not outweigh the benefits. In practice however, experience of those running the process, cost considerations and the lack of support from physicians may hamper the success of the initiative. Conclusion There is a lot of data and literature on the level of patient satisfaction and quality of care that is given in the different facilities by the nurses. In order for the research conducted to be used in the level of development and improvement of the different techniques and methods of care, there is a need for the researcher to conduct an accurate research on patient complaints. The literature that is available on patient satisfaction and care examines the determinants of patient satisfaction and caring methods and tools. This is compared between the data that is collected from the national hospitals as well as the data collected from the privately owned institutions and community programs. The literature identifies the effects of different variables and how they affect the overall performance and assessment of the quality of care by the patients in a hospital or a private institution. It is important therefore for the different nurses to ensure that they have implemented the best methods as highlighted and concluded in this research and literature review in order to improve on the quality of care. References Cohn, K., & Hough, D. 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