INVESTIGATING THE SATISFACTION STATUS OF THE PATIENTS APPLYING TO ERCIYES UNIVERSITY HEALTH ADMINISTRATION AND RESEARCH CENTER TO GET HEALTH TOURISM SERVICE

Abstract

ABSTRACT Aim: In this study it is aimed to investigate the satisfaction status of the patients applying Erciyes University Health Administration and Research Center (HARC) to get health tourism service in terms of the infrastructure of the institution, employee relations and service quality.Material-method: This descriptive study was conducted on 27 patients applying Erciyes University HARC between the years of 2016 – 2017. The English health tourism questionnaire prepared in the light of literature by the researchers has been conducted to the patients who accepted to participate in the research as data collection tool. The questionnaire included 15 questions about the policlinic/clinic applied, where the patient come from, the gender, age, education level, income level, the reason of arriving the country, the reasons of preferring this hospital and the satisfaction from the institution and staff, and an open-ended question asking for expectations and suggestions. Questionnaires of the pediatric patients were answered by their relatives. Frequency and percentage distributions were calculated in the analysis of the data.Results: 55.6% of the patients are male, 40.7% are over 41 years old, 26.6% are university graduates and incomes of 37.0% are in the range of TL 1501- TL 3000. 74.1% of patients to get health services, 7.4% to visit their relatives and 18.5% of the patient for other reasons came to Turkey. In our study, all of the patients (100%) answered "I am satisfied with the physicians of the hospital". Patients have stated that they were pleased mostly with "Safe country", "Hygiene status of the hospital", "Being informed about health status", "Approach of assistant staff", "International quality standards of the hospital", "Efforts of the hospital about solving the problems’ ‘Communication with assistant medical staff''. Areas that the satisfaction rate is relatively low (85.2%) were ''Education Quality of the Assistant Health Staff’ ‘The Hospital's Side Services (accommodation, transportation, interpreter ... etc.)," Short duration of the service that the patient received from the hospital".Conclusion: In our study, it has been found that there is general satisfaction in terms of the infrastructure of the institution, personnel relations and service quality. 85.2% satisfaction has been detected even in the areas that were relatively less than the satisfaction level ''Education Quality of the Assistant Health Personnel’ ‘The Hospital's Side Services (accommodation, transportation, interpreter ... etc.)," Shortened service period that the patient took from hospital". Keywords: Health Tourism, Hospital, Satisfaction