Evaluation of patient satisfaction with family physicians after implementation of family medicine in Turkey

Saritas, Ayhan/0000-0002-4302-1093; Saritas, Ayhan/0000-0002-4302-1093; KARA, ISMAIL HAMDI/0000-0003-2022-1882; KARA, ISMAIL HAMDI/0000-0003-2022-1882WOS: 000301754800019Patient's satisfaction is a desired out-come measure of quality of health care. It is direct feedback measurement and easy method. We aimed to evaluate level of patient's satisfaction with family physician after family medicine implementation at primary care settings in Turkey. This cross-sectional study was conducted in Turkey between January and May 2011 in 45 family medicine offices. The self-administered study survey including EURO-PEP tool was delivered with hand-out by researchers who were not family physicians to patients admitted to family health center. They were collected in closed-box. 1500 surveys were distributed. 1112 surveys were returned. Response rate was 74.13%. Of them, 54% (601) was female and 46% (511) was male. Mean age was 36.1+/-13.9 years-old. Overall rate of patient satisfaction was 70.9%. Rate for high satisfaction level (good-excellent) ranked between 53.5% and 82.4%. Item of" listening to patients" was rated by patients as highest satisfaction (82.4%). Item related with accessibility to physicians on phone was rated as lowest satisfaction (53.5%) by patients. Level of patient satisfaction with clinical behavior was considerably better than health care organization. In conclusion, the study showed that level of patient satisfaction was relatively high, especially with clinical behavior. The patients were less satisfied with health care organization, particularly with accessibility to physicians via phone and waiting time. We observed that patient satisfaction was improved, compared to before implementation of family medicine, and additionally lower than north European countries, but similar with some of the south European ones