The structure of a hospital's image.

Abstract

The study is intended to elucidate the factors that affect the creation of a hospital's image in the eyes of the patient and their relative weight in producing that image. The image of a hospital is important for enhancing the patient's reassurance and relief from possible anxiety that is hazardous to the health, which may result both from the patient's subjectively perceived seriousness of his condition and from his inability to judge the efficacy of the medical treatment in promoting recovery. A study was carried out among a representative sample of expatients of one of Israel's most prestigious university hospitals. Data ascertain the centrality of the physicians' and nurses' affective behavior in the creation of the image. They also show that the crucial factors that predict that image in the patient's eyes are the nurses' affective behavior and the hospital's perceived competence level, which is based predominantly on the patient's satisfaction with the medical treatment given by the physicians. That, in turn, is, to a great extent, predicted by the extent of satisfaction with the physicians' humane attitude toward the patient.