What Determinants Affect Inpatient Satisfaction in a Post-Acute Care Rehabilitation Hospital?

OBJECTIVE: To examine how specific hospital service domains (personal issues domain, discharge domain, rehabilitation doctor domain, nursing domain, physical therapist domain, occupational therapist domain, and food domain) influence final patient satisfaction scores, the overall quality of care, and willingness to recommend the hospital to others among patients in an inpatient rehabilitation hospital. DESIGN: Longitudinal study. SETTING: Patient-level data from electronic medical records were joined with Press Ganey (www.pressganey.com) satisfaction data for a single post-acute care inpatient rehabilitation facility in northeast Florida. PARTICIPANTS: Patients who participated in the inpatient rehabilitation survey (N=4,785). INTERVENTIONS: Not applicable. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Main outcome measures included final patient satisfaction scores, overall rating of care during the stay, and willingness to recommend the hospital to others. RESULTS: This study found the personal issues domain to be the most important factor in determining the final patient satisfaction score, overall rating of care, and likelihood to recommend the hospital to others, followed by the physical therapist, nurse, discharge, and food domains (P<.0001). Within the personal issues domain score, staff promptness and explanation upon arrival were areas identified as opportunities to make improvements that would result in the greatest positive effect. CONCLUSIONS: This work represents novel findings by investigating the major determinants of positive patient experience in a rehabilitation hospital setting. These findings provide actionable information to improve patient experience as well as where to focus improvement efforts using limited resources.