Patient satisfaction - results of cluster analysis of finnish patients.

BACKGROUND: Healthcare providers must understand patients' expectations and perceptions of the care they receive to provide high-quality care. The purpose of this study is to identify and analyse different clusters of patient satisfaction with the quality of care at Finnish acute care hospitals. METHODS: A cross-sectional design was applied. The data were collected in 2017 from three Finnish acute care hospitals with the Revised Humane Caring Scale (RHCS) as a paper questionnaire, including six background questions and six subscales. The k-means clustering method was used to define and analyse clusters in the data. The unit of analysis was a health system encompassing inpatients and outpatients. Clusters revealed the common characteristics shared by the different groups of patients. RESULTS: A total of 1810 patients participated in the study. Patient satisfaction was categorised into four groups: dissatisfied (n = 58), moderately dissatisfied (n = 249), moderately satisfied (n = 608), and satisfied (n = 895). The scores for each subscale were significantly above average in the satisfied patient group. The dissatisfied and moderately dissatisfied patient groups reported scores for all six subscales that were clearly below the average value. The groups significantly differed in terms of hospital admission (p = .013) and living situation (p = .009). Patients representing the dissatisfied and moderately dissatisfied groups were acutely admitted more frequently than patients in other groups and were more likely to live alone than satisfied and moderately satisfied patients. CONCLUSION: The results mostly demonstrated high levels of patient satisfaction; however, the perceptions of minority populations of dissatisfied patients should be assessed to identify shortcomings in the care provided. More attention should be paid to acutely admitted patients who are living alone and the pain and apprehension management of all patients.

Psychometric Testing of the Persian Version of the Revised Humane Caring Scale for Patients Admitted to Critical Care Units.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: To determine the psychometric properties of the Persian version of the Revised Humane Caring Scale (RHCS) for patients admitted to critical care units. METHODS: Data were collected from 337 patients admitted to critical care units. A methodological study was carried out to assess content, face and construct validity and reliability. RESULTS: The results revealed good content validity. After the elimination of four items in the confirmatory factor analysis, a 42-item model with acceptable fit indices was confirmed. The scale had a high internal consistency. The reliability of each item was satisfactory using the intra-class correlation. Only item 33 was considered unstable and was ultimately eliminated. CONCLUSIONS: The Persian version of the 41-item RHCS is an acceptable assessment scale for measuring patient satisfaction with humane caring in critical care units.

How to ask about patient satisfaction? The visual analogue scale is less vulnerable to confounding factors and ceiling effect than a symmetric Likert scale.

AIMS: To study the effects of scale type (visual analogue scale vs. Likert), item order (systematic vs. random), item non-response and patient-related characteristics (age, gender, subjective health, need for assistance with filling out the questionnaire and length of stay) on the results of patient satisfaction surveys. BACKGROUND: Although patient satisfaction is one of the most intensely studied issues in the health sciences, research information about the effects of possible instrument-related confounding factors on patient satisfaction surveys is scant. DESIGN: A quasi-experimental design was employed. A non-randomized sample of 150 surgical patients was gathered to minimize possible alterations in care quality. METHODS: Data were collected in May-September 2014 from one tertiary hospital in Finland using the Revised Humane Caring Scale instrument. New versions of the instrument were created for the present purposes. In these versions, items were either in a visual analogue format or Likert-scaled, in systematic or random order. The data were analysed using an analysis of covariance and a paired samples t-test. RESULTS: The visual analogue scale items were less vulnerable to bias from confounding factors than were the Likert-scaled items. The visual analogue scale also avoided the ceiling effect better than Likert and the time needed to complete the visual analogue scale questionnaire was 28% shorter than that needed to complete the Likert-scaled questionnaire. CONCLUSION: The present results supported the use of visual analogue scale rather than Likert scaling in patient satisfaction surveys and stressed the need to account for as many potential confounding factors as possible.

Psychometric testing of the Revised Humane Caring Scale for adult patients in Singapore.

In this study, we examined the validity and reliability of the Revised Humane Caring Scale as used by adult patients in a tertiary hospital in Singapore. A three-phase descriptive quantitative study was conducted. In phase I, an expert panel of nurses and inpatients examined the content validity of the scale; phase II comprised a pilot study on 20 patients; and in phase III, a large-scale study on 235 patients was implemented to test the internal consistency of the scale. The results revealed that the content validity index of the scale ranged from 0.856 to 1, and the scale had a high inter-rater agreement kappa value of 0.940. Cronbach's alpha ranged from 0.798 to 0.877 in phase II, and from 0.579 to 0.760 in phase III, respectively. The Revised Humane Caring Scale revealed good content validity and an acceptable level of internal consistency. The scale is an acceptable measurement tool for evaluating adult patients' satisfaction during hospitalization.