Healthcare quality and moderators of patient satisfaction: testing for causality.
OBJECTIVE
The purpose of this article is to present a comprehensive structural equation based service quality and patient satisfaction model taking into account the patient's condition before and after discharge. The authors aim to test for causality in a sample of patients from United Arab Emirates public hospitals.


METHODS
Data were collected using questionnaires completed by adults discharged (n = 244) from UAE public hospitals. The proposed model consists of five main constructs. Three represent service quality: quality of care (four variables); process and administration (four variables) and information (four variables). There is also one construct that represents patient's status (two variables--health status before admission and after discharge). Finally, there is one construct that represents patient's satisfaction with care (two variables--general and relative satisfaction). Structural equation modeling and LISREL using maximum likelihood estimation was used to test hypothesized model(s)/parameters(s) derived deductively from the literature.


RESULTS
The structural equation modeling representation provides a comprehensive picture that allows healthcare constructs and patient satisfaction causality to be tested. The goodness-of-fit statistics supported the healthcare quality-patient status-satisfaction model.


CONCLUSIONS
The model has been found to capture attributes that characterize healthcare quality in a developing country and could represent other modern healthcare systems. Also, it can be used to evaluate other healthcare practices from patients' viewpoints. The study highlights the importance of healthcare quality as patient satisfaction predictors by capturing other effects such as patient status.
Badri
Masood A
MA
United Arab Emirates University, College of Business Administration, Al Ain, United Arab Emirates. Masood@uaeu.ac.ae
Attia
Samaa
S
Ustadi
Abdulla M
AM
D022126:Access to Information; D015984:Causality; D006298:Health Services Administration / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D006304:Health Status; D016304:Hospitals, Private / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006779:Hospitals, Public / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006801:Humans; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D010353:Patient Education as Topic / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D017060:Patient Satisfaction / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011787:Quality of Health Care; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014479:United Arab Emirates