Abstract
BackgroundUnderstanding the perceived importance of Patient-Centered Care (PCC) among Palestinian doctors and how the provider and other clinical characteristics may impact their views on PCC is essential to determine the extent to which PCC can be implemented. This study investigates the provision of PCC among hospital doctors in a developing and unstable country, namely, Palestine.MethodsThis descriptive, cross-sectional research employed self-report survey among 369 Palestinian doctors working in hospitals in 2016. Respondents completed the Provider-Patient Relationship Questionnaire (PPRQ) and were asked to rate the importance of 16 PCC subjects in a context-free manner. Then they scored the existence of eight contextual attributes in their workplace.ResultsAlthough 71.4% of the participants got training in communication, only 45% of the participants knew about PCC. 48.8% of doctors considered the “exchange of information” with patients most important PCC component. Clustering identified three groups of doctors: 32.4% of doctors reported good perceptions of PCC, 47.5% moderate; and 20.1% poor. Older, married, and specialist doctors and those familiar with PCC are more likely classified in the “good” cluster. Results revealed a significant difference between doctors’ views based on their gender, experience, marital status, previous knowledge about PCC, and type of hospital in favor of males, experienced, married, familiar with PCC, and doctors in private hospital respectively. The level of job interest, nurses’ cooperation, the tendency of patients to hide information, and doctor’s friendly style were positively related with more perceived importance of PCC.ConclusionWe identified benchmark doctors who perceive the high relative importance of PCC. Our results highlighted knowledge gaps and training weaknesses among doctors in public and private hospitals in respect to their views on PCC. Decision makers may invest in the determined contextual predictors to enhance attitudes towards PCC. This work doesn’t address patients’ views on PCC.
Highlights
Understanding the perceived importance of Patient-Centered Care (PCC) among Palestinian doctors and how the provider and other clinical characteristics may impact their views on PCC is essential to determine the extent to which PCC can be implemented
No studies have examined the Palestinian doctors’ views on the provision of PCC, our work addresses a major gap in the literature by empirically investigating the perceived importance of PCC among doctors in a developing and unstable country, namely, Palestine
Our research project will answer the following research questions: RQ1: What is the relative importance of 16 PCC actions as perceived by the Palestinian doctors? RQ2: What are the PCC actions or doctor’s background that significantly classify Palestinian doctors into clusters based on their views on the importance of PCC? RQ3: Do Palestinian doctors perceive differently the importance of PCC components based on their socio-demographic characteristics or based on the type of hospital they work for? RQ4: What are the contextual factors related to the perceived importance of PCC components among Palestinian doctors?
Summary
Understanding the perceived importance of Patient-Centered Care (PCC) among Palestinian doctors and how the provider and other clinical characteristics may impact their views on PCC is essential to determine the extent to which PCC can be implemented. There is ample evidence to support that implementing Patient-Centered Care (PCC) enhances health outcomes in different ways: improved patient satisfaction, enhanced behavior change, building trust, improving patient adherence, better providers’ clinical accuracy, and more active patient self-management [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13]. The PCC approach emphasizes the effective provider-patient relationship and addresses better understanding of patient’s own feelings, preferences, and views about the disease and treatment [18]. The fundamental characteristics of PCC, as identified in the literature, are the patient involvement in care and the individualization of patient care [14]
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