Assessment of general public satisfaction with public healthcare services in Kedah, Malaysia.

BACKGROUND Patient satisfaction is considered an essential component of healthcare services evaluation and an additional indicator of the quality of healthcare. Moreover, patient satisfaction may also predict health-related behaviours of patients such as adherence to treatment and recommendations. AIMS The study aimed to assess patients' level of satisfaction with public healthcare services and to explore the association between socio-demographic and other study variables and patient satisfaction level. METHOD A cross-sectional study was conducted using selfadministered questionnaires distributed to a convenience sample of the general public in Kedah, Malaysia. RESULTS A total of 435 out of 500 people invited to participate in the study agreed to take part, giving a response rate of 87 per cent. In this study, only approximately half of the participants (n=198, 45.5 per cent) were fully satisfied with the current healthcare services. The majority of the participants agreed that doctors had given enough information about their state of health (n=222, 51 per cent) and were competent and sympathetic (n=231, 53.1 per cent). Almost half of the participants (n=215, 49.5 per cent) agreed that the doctors took their problems seriously. Only 174 (40 per cent) participants agreed that doctors had spent enough time on their consultation session. Some respondents (n=266, 61.2 per cent) agreed that healthcare professionals in the public health sector were highly skilled. The majority of the respondents described amenities, accessibility and facilities available in the public healthcare sector as good or better. In this study, waiting time was significantly associated with patient satisfaction as the results showed that those who waited longer than two hours were less satisfied with the services than those who waited under two hours. CONCLUSION The study findings showed that approximately half of the respondents were fully satisfied with current healthcare services. In this study, waiting time was the main factor that affected patient satisfaction level. Other factors that influenced satisfaction level included the length of consultation sessions and the process of patient registration. Hence, improvement in the health services that leads to a shorter waiting time may increase the satisfaction level of patients.