Satisfaction from health care during hospitalization in the pediatric clinic of a general hospital in Attica Greece

Introduction: Over the last few decades, the interest of healthcare professionals is increasingly centered on patient satisfaction with the healthcare provided. Aim: The aim is to assess the parents'/guardians' satisfaction with the services/conditions of the children who have been hospitalized in a General Hospital providing health services in the prefecture of Attica. Method-Sample: The sample consists of 100 parents/guardians of children hospitalized during the period June-November 2017. Sampling was performed randomly. For the needs of the study, a questionnaire with closed type questions was used. The statistical package SPSS 20.0 was used for the statistical analysis of the data. Results: The average rate of hospital evaluation was 8.02. As far as the medical services were concerned (being shown kindness, being listened to carefully, being explained to and being kept informed), the parents expressed a fairly high level of satisfaction, an average of 83.7%. The mean medical staff rating score was 3.27 (standard deviation 0.54, median 3.5, minimum 1.75 and maximum 3.75) and the mean nursing staff rating score was 3.13 (standard deviation 0.84, median 3, minimum 1 and maximum 4).The parents/guardians who experienced long waiting times in the emergency department before the child was examined, rated the nursing staff with a lower score(p = 0.037) and rated the hospital as a whole with a lower score (p = 0.002). Other analyzed parameters included speed of admission, examination room cleanliness, waiting time for emergency medical examination, child’s isolation during the medical examination so he/she could not be seen or heard by people, who should not have been able to do so, kindness shown by the administrative staff, with satisfaction results of 68%, 91%, 59%, 75%, 62% respectively. Conclusions: This research has shown that, overall, satisfaction with the hospital services being provided was satisfactory, however, improvement is needed. The results showed weaknesses in the long waiting time for the medical examination in the pediatric emergency department.

Keywords: Pediatric patients, hospitalized children, hospital services, hospital conditions, satisfaction, quality