Patient Satisfaction Rates Determined By Facility Size, Language
By Christine Kern, contributing writer
Patients reported lower satisfaction rates at large urban hospitals.
Large, urban hospitals are at a distinct disadvantage under the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ patient satisfaction rating system, according to research published in the Journal of Hospital Medicine.
“Across the country, large hospital size and non-English as a primary language predicted poor patient satisfaction scores while white race and higher education level predicted better scores,” co-author Daniel McFarland, a clinical fellow at Mount Sinai's Icahn School of Medicine, said according to Medical Xpress. “Other demographic factors were also important but these four were the most significant.”
An ACSI report found overall patient satisfaction is nearing a 10-year low, even as demand for services is on the rise. And large, urban hospitals, which often have large numbers of low-income patients and patients and staff who speak English as a second language, are facing even larger obstacles.
Though the trends of lower satisfaction and higher demand may seem to be at odds, one actually informs the other, ACSI Managing Director David VanAmburg said in an announcement. “The influx of the newly insured is putting pressure on a system that is still playing catch up,” he said. “Rising demand that is outpacing supply, coupled with increasing healthcare costs, is a formula for lower satisfaction.”
The Mount Sinai Medical Center study published in the Journal of Hospital Medicine found hospital size and English as the primary language are the main predictors of patient satisfaction. The lowest scores were in densely populated areas versus higher scores in less populated areas. Data was surveyed from more than 900,000 patients at about 4,000 hospitals.
“Across the country, large hospital size and non-English as a primary language predicted poor patient satisfaction scores while white race and higher education levels predicted better scores,” said study author Daniel McFarland.
Moving forward, patient satisfaction scores will have a larger, more instrumental role in Medicare reimbursement formulas, which means hospitals will need to find ways to improve these scores in order to achieve a successful transition from fee-for-services to a value-based system. This challenge will be especially daunting for large, urban facilities, as this study points out. According to study authors, the current formula must be adjusted to achieve parity among all hospitals sizes and types, and they offer a formula they developed to achieve this.