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How to conduct patient satisfaction survey

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Patient satisfaction surveys allow you to translate patients’ feedback into meaningful and actionable data to evaluate their medical care experience. It helps healthcare providers identify different ways to improve the quality of care, accessibility, and experience in the facility. 

Patient care surveys help you tackle three objectives, care quality (Are the patients satisfied with the medical care?), accessibility to the care (Is it easy to book appointments?), and experience with care providers (Are the staffs and physicians respectful and compassionate?).

In this blog, we will see how you can leverage patient satisfaction questionnaire in hospitals to uncover the key drivers of satisfaction and dissatisfaction. 

What Is Patient Satisfaction Survey?

It is a series of questions designed to elicit feedback from patients on the quality of treatment provided by a healthcare provider. The patient satisfaction survey aids in the adjudication of fundamental metrics throughout patient care, assisting medical facilities in evaluating the degree of care delivered and service faults.

Six fundamental indicators you should use to assess patient satisfaction are as follows:

  • Quality of medical treatment, 
  • Medical practitioners’ interpersonal abilities,
  • Communication and transparency between the care provider and the patient,
  • The financial elements of health care,
  • Availability of doctors and other medical professionals,
  • Care accessibility.

A patient satisfaction questionnaire in hospitals can be given at any point through an electronic medical record (EMR) or electronic health record (EHR). It can be done using a mobile device, paper copies of the survey, a website, a point-of-sale device, computers in waiting rooms, or any other media.

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What Are Some Examples Of Unique Patient Satisfaction Survey Questions?

The health business contains many diverse nodes of care providers due to its nature and volume of operation. At key milestones, timely input must be gathered. However, the questions will alter depending on the sort of medical care/facility. 

Below you can see some examples of patient satisfaction survey questions for different healthcare use cases. 

→Hospitals

  1. How would you rank the procedure of investigational diagnosis that you went through?

Patients often visit doctors with localized pain and are unsure how to describe the pain and other symptoms to medical experts. Running an investigative diagnosis using a combination of patient history and family history, conducting tests, and delivering necessary medicine necessitates expertise and foresight on the side of medical care providers. 

The question can provide insight into the patient’s experience during the diagnostic procedure and their satisfaction with the process.

  1. How frequently did you receive contradictory information from various medical care personnel at this hospital?

One of the most essential yardsticks for determining the level of your present personnel is to track the number of times a patient receives contradictory information from multiple medical care specialists. Patient feedback will help in the establishment of a procedure for disseminating knowledge and doing on-the-job training as needed.

  1. What is the difference in the quality of treatment offered by the hospitals in your area?

Hospitals must constantly give excellent care to all of their patients. It is also critical to capitalize on our strengths while incorporating best practices from other institutions in the local area. The patient satisfaction survey form may provide you with a fast overview of where you stand in comparison to our localized counterparts.

  1. Was the hospital properly splitting your copayments and coinsurances between Medicare and Medicaid?

Being insured by Medicare and Medicaid is not a personal option but rather a federal requirement. As a result, if patients are asked inappropriate questions about their coverage and are wrongly billed, they will leave. Conducting a healthcare well-being survey aids in the streamlining of services for the elderly and underserved.

→Primary Care Providers

  1. Did you feel at ease speaking with the gynecologist as a woman?

Many women are apprehensive about seeing a gynecologist for a variety of reasons. Collecting input on how comfortable someone is with visiting or discussing their condition through a women’s health care survey might make it simpler to be assertive and make the patient comfortable.

  1. Is your primary care physician capable of making a quick diagnosis and prescribing medication?

When someone becomes unwell, their first reaction is to go to their primary care physician rather than a hospital. Most of the time, this is the only medical treatment necessary, but if primary care is insufficient, a patient may be obliged to seek secondary care. The physician practices survey can help capture feedback on care delivered as the initial point of contact for someone who is ill.

Related read: How to elevate Patient Experience the right way?

→Secondary Care Providers

  1. Did the pharmacy staff charge your insurance company and collect the correct deductible from you for your medications?

Health insurance is currently more extensively utilized as a result of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Because of the structure of the payer ecosystem, health plans differ by state, federal, and private, and so deductibles differ. With Trumpcare replacing the Affordable Care Act, point-of-sale medical health providers, such as pharmacies, must charge the patient correctly and collect the appropriate deductibles.

  1. Were the ambulatory staff members prompt in responding to your medical care request?

One of the most significant care providers in the healthcare business is first responders. A patient’s ability to recover fully depends on timely and effective medical care. Using patient satisfaction surveys to evaluate the speed and efficiency of each emergency call is critical for streamlining services and becoming even more successful.

  1. How many times do you visit your dentist in a year?

Patients are typically apprehensive about visiting dentists owing to a lack of awareness about dental hygiene and the trauma of being seated in a dentist’s chair. Collecting feedback via the Oral health survey form may be a useful benchmark for determining how comfortable patients are with dentists and how this can be improved.

Read how Voxco helped D.G. Solution grow their business by 4x in a single year!

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→Specialized Medical Care

  1. Were the employees understanding of your addiction?

Patients at de-addiction facilities may not always want to be there. Being aware of the addiction and breaking free from it requires a great deal of mental fortitude and hard effort. Employees at de-addiction centers must be aware of how comfortable their approaches are for assisting patients in dealing with their addiction, as well as how successful their tactics are.

  1. Did the psychiatrist accurately identify your condition and give a prompt treatment?

Mental health is one of the most overlooked diseases, as well as one of the most difficult to diagnose due to the lack of obvious signs. It makes the diagnosis and counseling much more difficult. Collecting feedback through the usage of a mental health survey question is critical for a psychiatrist since it allows them to be more effective.

  1. Did the birthing center offer enough postnatal care?

The birth of a child is one of the most anticipated events in the lives of a woman and her family. As a result, every part of the delivery process must be top-notch in order to keep the mother and kid comfortable and free of medical issues. 

Gathering feedback from new mothers and families using patient satisfaction surveys shows that you are concerned about their experience and want to ensure it is perfect. 

  1. Did the radiology center deliver the scan results on the same day?

People may visit independent radiography clinics if their health insurance does not cover the radiology lab at a hospital. It indicates that using an outside radiology center lengthens the time it takes to make a diagnosis or assess health improvement. It shortens the time it takes to get reports, which increases patient satisfaction, and the radiology center must work to streamline processes continuously. 

Additional read: Importance of healthcare market research.

→Extended Medical Care Organizations

  1. Did the extended medical care facility provide you with any pointers on how to reintegrate into society?

People who have been in an extended medical care facility for many years and are returning to society are unaware of how difficult it will be to live alone after such a lengthy period. Counselors at the extended medical care facility should give rules for living and keep the patient informed of what has to be done when they return to society.

  1. How would you rate the medical staff’s service to you in the previous 12 months?

Many patients are forced to stay in an extended medical care facility due to specific conditions, mental health issues, the need for daily care, and so on. Leveraging patient satisfaction surveys from such patients can help you gather honest truth about the quality of care and the interpersonal abilities of the staff. 

→Veterinarian 

  1. How long did it take the doctor to diagnose your pet’s illness?

It is more difficult to diagnose what is wrong with animals since symptoms cannot be confirmed rapidly. As a result, a correct and prompt diagnosis becomes even more critical to the pet’s health. Conducting a veterinary survey allows you to get objective, actionable feedback on the treatment process from the pet owner.

How To Make A Patient Satisfaction Survey?

A patient care survey must include the appropriate questions to elicit a larger number of replies. They must also be comprehensive in nature, covering all aspects of a patient’s medical treatment while being simple to respond to and including a combination of open-ended survey questions and other questions kinds. It is also beneficial to map out problem areas and gain an understanding of the degree of the problem and areas that our consumers – the patients, may improve.

See the true power of using an integrated survey platform to conduct online, offline (field) and phone (CATI & IVR) surveys along with a built-in analytical suite.

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What Are The Benefits Of Conducting A Patient Satisfaction Survey?

In many circumstances, important aspects of a medical facility’s operation go neglected owing to a scarcity of patient input and a general lack of knowledge about the challenges that patients confront while seeking consultation and treatment. It is here that patient satisfaction surveys come in handy, as they give an excellent forum for patients to express honest opinions based on their experience. 

Let’s take a look at why doing frequent patient care surveys is so important for retaining and expanding our patient visitors. There are many benefits of patient satisfaction surveys in healthcare.

Map and track a patient’s journey: 

A medical institute must measure its patients’ happiness with the service they get. It is usually suggested to perform patient care surveys at crucial interactions with the medical staff and your institution at large to guarantee effective patient care. It allows us to identify and address areas of poor satisfaction.

Collect information regarding patient loyalty: 

Incorporating a patient Net Promoter Score question – “Considering your overall experience with our medical facility, how likely would you be to recommend us to a friend or colleague?” – can help you estimate the patient’s loyalty. Loyalty comes from satisfaction, so patient NPS can be a good indicator of satisfaction. 

In many circumstances, whether patients had a bad experience or a good experience, they would tell their friends and colleagues about it. While a negative experience will harm your facility’s reputation, a favorable experience will help you promote a positive image.

Hospital administrators should calculate patient Net Promoter Score at each touchpoint in the journey or at the end of their treatment. It guarantees that the organization closes the feedback loop on patients to resolve the concerns of the detractive patients’, turn passives into promoters, and continue delivering exceptional experiences to promoters. 

Report any ill-treatment by hospital personnel: 

A patient satisfaction survey form encourages openness by giving patients and their families a forum to discuss any maltreatment by hospital staff and bring it to the attention of management. The management team can either terminate those employees or coach them to be polite to all patients that visit the medical institution.

Effective patient care: 

Among the many benefits of patient satisfaction surveys, medical institutions can uncover the gap between patient needs and their provisions. Medical facilities can have a better understanding of their operating efficiency, which can be used to close the discovered gap.

Every business, including healthcare, has grown more customer-focused. Several areas in a medical institution’s operations require development, and this is where learning directly from clients becomes beneficial. A hospital or healthcare institution can ask patients directly how they can better serve them better in order to continuously improve in response to changes in patient views and opinions.

Provide patients with timely services: 

Eight out of ten medical professionals stated that they attended to all of their patients precisely at their scheduled times. Almost half of the patients, on the other hand, believe that they are never called in at their scheduled appointment time.

A patient satisfaction survey helps you understand the gap between the patient’s experience and the experience you assume they receive. The feedback helps clearly see where you are lacking in terms of accessibility and timely service. 

Learn about hygiene levels: 

Last in our list of benefits of a patient satisfaction questionnaire in hospitals is that you can get an authentic account of the hospital’s hygiene levels. Logistically, patients are more likely to attend a hospital with clean and sanitary amenities. 

It is impractical to expect the management to check on hospital hygiene every moment. With a patient care survey, you can evaluate hygiene and uncover patients’ expectations and dissatisfaction.

Related read: The case of patient engagement.

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HIPAA Compliance For Patient Satisfaction Survey

A strong sense of data integrity governs patient care and the medical industry. Patients are hesitant to disclose medical information because they believe the information should be treated with exceptional confidentiality and care.

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) establishes a framework for the acquisition of sensitive patient data. Medical institutions are permitted to conduct evaluation surveys for patient care and, in general, collect actionable input for healthcare operations under HIPAA privacy standards. Feedback on the quality of treatment delivered by medical personnel as part of a survey or questionnaire completed by a patient is regarded as a quality evaluation and improvement activity. It is part of the health care system. If a medical care provider gathers patient health information (PHI), that caregiver is subject to HIPAA regulations.

If a patient offers comments or answers to a survey as “private communication,” HIPAA compliance requires that the patient’s request be respected and carried out as asked. 

HIPAA also requires that when PHI is gathered, any ICD-10 or ICD-11 codes in the survey template be sufficiently marked out. Each code is stated in full so that the patient is aware of the payer and its provider’s technical information. 

Conclusion

Today, more and more healthcare organizations use patient satisfaction survey questions to uncover the gaps in customer care and identify ways to improve the patient experience. Using surveys help you convey to your patients and their family that their opinion is very important. 

Online surveys allow you to gather feedback and analyze them immediately. Moreover, it also allows for keeping patients’ identities anonymous. This means you gather honest and accurate feedback on how they feel about your organization. 

Voxco’s healthcare survey software allows you to conduct online, offline, and phone surveys so you can engage patients in their preferred way of contact. 

Net Promoter®, NPS®, NPS Prism®, and the NPS-related emoticons are registered trademarks of Bain & Company, Inc., Satmetrix Systems, Inc., and Fred Reichheld. Net Promoter Score℠ and Net Promoter System℠ are service marks of Bain & Company, Inc., Satmetrix Systems, Inc., and Fred Reichheld.

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