Patient satisfaction with the quality of health care services provided by selected health facilities within cape coast metropolis, Ghana

Abstract

Customer satisfaction is key in keeping any organisation in business. The satisfaction of patients who are the main customers of health care is very important to keep health care institutions relevant and in business. This study sought to determine patient satisfaction with quality of healthcare provided by three health facilities in the Cape Coast Metropolis. Data were collected using structured questionnaire on predisposing, need, enabling factors and quality of care from 385 randomly selected clients from the three health facilities. The data was entered into SPSS and analysed using Fishers exact test and Chi Square at 95% confidence interval (p < 0.05) was considered significant. The findings revealed the satisfaction level as follows; very satisfied (4.2%), fairly satisfied (91.4%) and not satisfied (4.4%). Patient satisfaction is dependent on the quality of care received (p = 0.010). The following factors were found to have contributed significantly to patient satisfaction; family income (p<0.001), cost (p< 0.001), waiting time (p=0.016), information disclosure (p=0.000) and environmental cleanliness (p<0.001). On the other hand the contribution of socio demographic characteristic of the patient and the major health problem the patient reported to the hospital with to the satisfaction of the patient were found not to be significant. The role of quality of care in patient satisfaction cannot be overemphasized. There is the need for management of health facilities in the metropolis to strive to improve upon the quality of care provided at their facilities in order to satisfy clients. Mechanisms should be put in place to decrease waiting time, provide useful information to patients and provide affordable services in a clean environment.