Abstract
BackgroundSurveying patients’ satisfaction is essential to improve patient-centered care, however, studies on satisfaction and their correlates among psychiatric inpatients are rare in China. This study aimed to measure satisfaction levels of psychiatric inpatients in a national sample and to examine individual and institutional correlates.MethodsAs part of the National Survey for the Evaluation of Psychiatric Hospital Performance, psychiatric inpatients from 32 tertiary psychiatric hospitals in 29 Chinese provinces were interviewed on the day of discharge by trained research staff. Satisfaction was assessed using a five-item questionnaire. Patients’ sociodemographic and clinical information were manually retrieved from medical records and institutional data were provided by participating hospitals. Multilevel linear regression was used to assess factors associated with level of satisfaction.ResultsAmong 1663 inpatients, the reported satisfaction levels were high, with a mean score of 23.3 ± 2.4 out of 25. Education level was positively associated with global satisfaction, satisfaction with costs, and satisfaction with privacy protection. Treatment response was associated with global satisfaction and with the doctor-patient communication subscore. The number of psychotherapy sessions was positively associated with the privacy protection subscore (coefficient = 0.0, P = 0.046). The Global Assessment of Function score was positively associated with the doctor-patient communication subscore (coefficient = 0.0, P = 0.003). Total satisfaction scores and all five subscores were positively associated with hospital-level factors, and patients discharged from hospitals with better staffing and resources reported significantly higher levels of satisfaction.ConclusionOverall, psychiatric inpatients in China were satisfied with the services they received. To further improve patient satisfaction, mental health professionals should optimize their patients’ treatment response as much as possible before discharge and provide more psychological treatment during the hospitalization. The government should also provide more resources to increase the number of mental health professionals (nurses, psychologists, and psychiatrists) working in psychiatric hospitals.
Highlights
Surveying patients’ satisfaction is essential to improve patient-centered care, studies on satisfaction and their correlates among psychiatric inpatients are rare in China
Our study identified important factors associated with psychiatric inpatient satisfaction, some of which are at the individual level and others at the institutional level
We found that patients with higher education levels had higher scores on global satisfaction, cost satisfaction, and privacy protection satisfaction
Summary
Surveying patients’ satisfaction is essential to improve patient-centered care, studies on satisfaction and their correlates among psychiatric inpatients are rare in China. This study aimed to measure satisfaction levels of psychiatric inpatients in a national sample and to examine individual and institutional correlates. Patient satisfaction is an important and commonly utilized measure for healthcare quality and research [1, 2]. Many factors have been associated with patient satisfaction in psychiatry. While most surveys found psychiatric patient satisfaction was good or high [11, 12], and better than patients with non-psychiatric disorders, some found the contrary. The authors used survey data from the 1991 Medicare Current Beneficiary Survey They found aged and disabled beneficiaries with psychiatric disorders were significantly less likely than those without disorders to be satisfied with the overall quality of health care, follow-up care, and the physician’s concern for their overall health [13]. With respect to psychiatric diagnosis, some studies found that patients with schizophrenia were less satisfied than patients with other psychiatric disorders [14,15,16,17], while other studies showed the opposite trend [11, 18]: patients with schizophrenia were more satisfied compared to those without schizophrenia
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