An evaluation of patients' opinions of primary care physicians: the use of EUROPEP in Gaza Strip-Palestine.
The objective of this paper is to identify the level of patients' satisfaction with primary care physicians. Data were gathered from an exit interview using a standardized questionnaire (EUROPEP) and background variables. A total of 956 patients in fifteen primary health care clinics in Gaza Strip participated. Outcome measures is positive patient satisfaction (good and excellent ratings in the EUROPEP Index). As a results, the mean percentage of positive satisfaction with medical services was poor (41.8%). The poorest performance was recorded for: getting through to the clinic on the phone, being able to speak to physician on the telephone, time spent in waiting rooms and helping the patient deal with emotional problems. The comparison between clinical behaviour dimension and organization of care showed that clinical behaviour was evaluated higher. In conclusion, Palestinian patients expressed overall dissatisfaction with services provided by primary care physicians. These findings present a real challenge for Palestinian authority policy makers and administrators in terms of designing appropriate quality improvement strategies.
Department of Social Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Crete, PO Box 2208, 71003 Heraklion, Crete, Greece.
Tayser
T
Abu Mourad
Suzanne
S
Shashaa
Adelais
A
Markaki
Athanasios
A
Alegakis
Christos
C
Lionis
Anastas
A
Philalithis
D000328:Adult; D018912:Arabs; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008877:Middle East; D017060:Patient Satisfaction / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D010821:Physicians, Family; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires