Weekly Article: Patient satisfaction surveys: Two perspectives

by Sabah Iqbal MD 

Why Rating Your Doctor Is Bad For Your Health

 My first article comes from Forbes Magazine and analyzes why the Press Ganey scores are bad for patients.

 Some pertinent points:

• Doctors driven to achieve patient “satisfaction” may over-test and over-treat illness. (How many times have you heard “I want antibiotics for this cold/virus/stomach bug.” “I want an xray” “I want a scan of her head”) 
• Over-testing has been shown to lead to false-positive results, which, in turn, can lead to a cycle of testing/treating/referrals that ultimately proves costly for the health care system as a whole and can lead to costs to patients and their families 
• Over-prescribing of antibiotics can cause harm
• Patients with higher satisfaction scores were more likely to die

 

Patient--my child: seven priorities for improving pediatric care from the parent's perspective

 My second article is from a nursing journal. This study looked at 50,000 pediatric inpatients at over 65 hospitals all over the country (although it appears CNMC was not included) and surveyed their families about satisfaction. They showed that patient/parent satisfaction was generally higher at stand-alone pediatric hospitals (yeah us!), but that we all have room for improvement. They found the following 7 areas to most consistently need improvement: Food for thought:

1) Improve staff sensitivity to the inconvenience of having a child hospitalized (missed work, arranging childcare for other kids, provide wifi, charging stations for phones/laptops, etc)

2) Improve addressing spiritual and emotional needs of child and parent (provide chaplain, take spiritual histories)

3) Improve staff responses to patient/parent complaints during the stay (acknowledge complaint, be appreciative of parent trying to make your hospital better)

4) Involve parents in decision making for their child.

5) Improve accommodations and comfort for visitors (have space for families to visit; make sure parents have somewhere comfortable to sit when waiting in ED with their child)

6) Provide info to families about what services are offered (where are places to shower, wash clothes, eat, etc)

7) Make child’s stay in hospital more restful (quiet rooms, pleasant rooms, child-friendly spaces, don’t wake sleeping child for interventions – aka, get rid of our horrible triples rooms!)