The Relationship between Teamwork and Empowerment to Patient Satisfaction in Orthopedic Settings: An Exploratory Study

Abstract

Purpose - Health care reform mandates public reporting of patient satisfaction ratings which are used by both payers to establish reimbursement and by patients to evaluate and select providers for specialty care. Improving patient satisfaction ratings offers the potential to increase market share, reimbursement rates, and patient retention.Therefore, the purpose of this study was to measure the relationship between employee ratings of teamwork and empowerment and patient satisfaction scores at 14 orthopedic outpatient settings in the North Central Region of the United States. Design/methodology/approach - This study employed a quantitative, correlational approach. Surveys of employee perceptions of teamwork and empowerment were compared to patient satisfaction survey scores for strength and direction of correlation. Regression analysis measured the degrees of strength and correlation between subset scores of teamwork and empowerment to the patient satisfaction scores.Findings - There was a strong correlation between patient satisfaction and employee ratings of teamwork with a weak correlation between patient satisfaction and employee ratings of empowerment. Empowerment subsets of support and job activity scale demonstrated statistical significance toward patient satisfaction.Teamwork subsets of team structure, communication, and monitoring significantly impacted patient satisfaction. Research limitations/implications - The sample size of clinics proved small for greater application or generalizability. However, this research provides valuable information for further research and provides healthcare leaders information for possible adaptation to improve market sharePractical implications - Findings suggest that health care leaders can potentially increase patient satisfaction by making efforts toimprove teamwork. Improvement of teamwork can be achieved by specifically addressinghow teams understand their individual roles and how individuals can help each other when workload increases.Originality/value -This study provides a practical understanding of how staff cohesiveness positively influences patient satisfaction which may improve market share through patient retention.