Evaluation of health care service quality in Poland with the use of SERVQUAL method at the specialist ambulatory health care center

INTRODUCTION: Service quality and customer satisfaction are very important components of competitive advantage in the health care sector. The SERVQUAL method is widely used for assessing the quality expected by patients and the quality of actually provided services. OBJECTIVES: The main purpose of this study was to determine if patients from state and private health care facilities differed in terms of their qualitative priorities and assessments of received services. MATERIALS AND METHODS: The study included a total of 412 patients: 211 treated at a state facility and 201 treated at a private facility. Each of the respondents completed a 5-domain, 22-item SERVQUAL questionnaire. The actual quality of health care services in both types of facilities proved significantly lower than expected. RESULTS: All the patients gave the highest scores to the domains constituting the core aspects of health care services. The private facility respondents had the highest expectations with regard to equipment, and the state facility ones regarding contacts with the medical personnel. CONCLUSION: Health care quality management should be oriented toward comprehensive optimization in all domains, rather than only within the domain identified as the qualitative priority for patients of a given facility.