Determinants of Patient satisfaction that impact hospital quality improvement: Evidence from a systematic literature review

Abstract

Patient satisfaction in healthcare is recognized internationally as important for patient-centered, high-quality healthcare delivery. As part of continuous quality improvement, its measurement requires development of agreed standards and observable metrics. The identification of patient satisfaction determinants has been tackled in a large number of studies, and the findings are still inconclusive. Moreover, it is understood that there is conflicting data in patient satisfaction surveys. The objective of the current study was to systematically review the extent of patient-reported satisfaction indicators obtained, articulated and used to influence quality improvement across healthcare settings. Two research priorities such as reviewing evidences on necessary patient satisfaction measures and systematically identifying patient satisfaction in healthcare settings around the world were explicitly addressed with a view to enhancing the quality of Bangladeshi hospitals. This systematic analysis complied with the guidelines of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) report. The research was conducted in Google Scholar, Medline, Emerald, Pub-Med and Science Direct in December 2020. The peer-reviewed English language journals published between January 2001 and December 2020 were included for the synthesis in this study. In a wide range of research, many determinants of patient satisfaction have been studied. However, due to no internationally agreed formulation of patient satisfaction and measurement method, the study findings were diverse. The most important determinants of patient satisfaction in the studies were healthcare service quality measures. Among them, the interpersonal care quality of health professionals was the critical determinant of patient satisfaction. The influence and direction of patient satisfaction groups have been found to be inconsistent. Therefore, the possible determinants and confounders can simultaneously be considered to be person-related characteristics. All possible features that could have had effects on satisfaction could not be seen by the selected studies. There is a need for further research using a structured questionnaire about how cultural, behavioral, and sociodemographic variations impact patient satisfaction.