SERVICE QUALITY AND CONSUMERISM: A WAY TOWARDS HEALTHCARE EXCELLENCE

Measuring the quality of intangible service products has become a great challenge for managers, administrators and policy makers in the health services industry. Patient satisfaction or dissatisfaction is a complicated phenomenon that is linked to patient expectations, patient rights, health status, personal characteristics as well as health system characteristics. However, patient satisfaction as an indicator of quality of healthcare has evolved as an outcome measure and patient satisfaction surveys are being increasingly identified to be established yardsticks to measure success of the service delivery system functional at hospitals. In general, patient satisfaction has been defined as an evaluation that reflects the perceived differences between expectations of the patient to what is actually received during the process of care.