Performance Evaluation of Hospitals in Shiraz, Iran Based on Medical Professional Ethics During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Objective The outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has led to many visits of patients to medical centers which has subsequently affected the performance evaluation of hospitals. One of the important non-financial performance measures is medical professional ethics. This study aims to evaluate the performance and rank the hospitals in Shiraz, Iran based on medical professional ethics affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods Based on the balanced scorecard (BCS) method, the indicators were divided into four perspectives. Then, using the decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL) method, the causality between the four BSC perspectives as well as the relative weights between the evaluation indicators were determined. The fuzzy data envelopment analysis (DEA) method was used to rank the performance of 37 hospitals. The DEA model ranked the decision-making units (DMUs) based on efficiency. Results The DMUs (hospitals) 1, 3, 5, 8, 12, 13, 17, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 35, 36 and 37 were efficient, while others were inefficient.  Conclusion The efficiency of hospitals in Shiraz is lower in learning and growth perspective than in other perspectives, and all hospitals are efficient in terms of customer perspective. This indicates that hospital managers pay less attention to learning and growth and more attention to the customer (patients) perspective during the COVID-19 pandemic.