Patient Satisfaction Among the OPD Attendees at a Secondary Care Hospital in Northern India.

Patient satisfaction reflects the quality and effectiveness of healthcare. Healthcare services have become more patient-centric in today's era as patients are viewed as active consumers of healthcare services rather than passive recipients. Measuring patient satisfaction level has become an objective criterion for defining the effectiveness of these services. Feedback from patients makes healthcare services more responsive to the expectations of patients. We conducted a cross-sectional study among 200 OPD attendees of a secondary-care hospital to assess the level of satisfaction. A 5-point Likert scale was used to record the responses. For overall satisfaction with the OPD services, most common responses were "good" or "very-good", with mean (SD) score of 3.8 (0.77). Majority of the patients were satisfied with facilities such as drinking water and toilets, and with consultation time provided by the doctors. The patients were not satisfied with the time taken at the registration window and behavior of other hospital employees. This highlights the importance of reorientation training on communication and interpersonal skills for all categories of healthcare staff.