Patients' satisfaction with professional behaviour of Bulgarian General practitioners

Nevena Ivanova

Keywords: patient satisfaction, proffesional beahviour, general practitioner

Aim:

To study patients' satisfaction with GPs' communicative and organizational professional behaviour

Method:

a pilot study of 100 patients was conducted in Plovdiv. A special questionnaire was developed

Results:

A manner of reception during opening consultation was evaluated-56,9% of patients answered that it was always attentive, polite and friendly, 32,3% sometimes, 8,5% more often inattentive, impolite and unwelcoming, 2,3% always with indifference. 63,7% pointed out that their GP listened to the patient’s complaints carefully, focused and interested, 29,9% distracted, 6,4% nervous and hurried. 70% of patients think that GP answered to their questions calmly and in understandable language, 22,3% calmly, but not understandable, 7,7% nervously and not understandable. 51,5% of responders were completely satisfied with practice working hours, 33,5% partially satisfied and recommend changes, 15% were unsatisfied. 15% of patients needed continuous home care, but only 3% of them received regular home visit by GP which caused dissatisfaction.

Conclusions:

In primary health care the relationship doctor-patient plays a key role. There is a constant interaction between them, and dissatisfaction may negatively affect this relationship. The behaviour of GPs is "directed" towards providing affordable, safe and effective medical care that is acceptable and approved by patients. Thus, adequate satisfaction of the needs of both parties - doctors and patients - can be achieved. GP’s professional behaviour impacts patient satisfaction. More than half of the patients were satisfied with communicative aspects of GP’s behaviour, whereas 60% were partially satisfied or unsatisfied with organizational aspect. Future institutional changes are needed to improve that process.

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