Title: Seeking interactions between patient satisfaction and efficiency in primary healthcare: cluster and DEA analysis

Authors: Panagiotis Mitropoulos; Nikolaos Mastrogiannis; Ioannis Mitropoulos

Addresses: Department of Business Planning and Information Systems, Technological Education Institute of Patras, GR-26500 Patras, Greece ' Department of Business Planning and Information Systems, Technological Education Institute of Patras, GR-26500 Patras, Greece ' Department of Business Planning and Information Systems, Technological Education Institute of Patras, GR-26500 Patras, Greece

Abstract: This study investigates efficiency and quality of care in primary healthcare centres. At first, we performed cluster analysis to group health centres by their level of quality based on user's experiences that were collected from a satisfaction survey over a representative sample of patients. Secondly, a DEA analysis was conducted by generating bootstrapped efficiency scores for each health centre, and then we regressed these scores on variables that represent clusters from certain dimensions of patient satisfaction. The results of this study indicate statistically significant relations of health centres' efficiency with several dimensions of patient satisfaction. More specifically we identified direct relations of efficiency with accessibility, lab services and facilities. On the other hand there exist inverse relationships of the health centres efficiency with patients' opinions regarding scheduling appointment and doctor services.

Keywords: cluster analysis; MCDM; multicriteria decision making; efficiency; care quality; bootstrap DEA; data envelopment analysis; truncated regression; regression analysis; primary healthcare; health centres; patient satisfaction; user experiences; accessibility; laboratory services; appointment scheduling; doctor services.

DOI: 10.1504/IJMCDM.2014.064795

International Journal of Multicriteria Decision Making, 2014 Vol.4 No.3, pp.234 - 251

Received: 02 May 2012
Accepted: 28 Nov 2012
Published online: 30 Sep 2014 *

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