Patients' satisfaction with emergency care services in a University Teaching Hospital in South-West, Nigeria

BACKGROUND: Patient satisfaction is a measure of the extent to which patients are contented with the health care they received from their health care provider. OBJECTIVE: The goal of this study was to measure the satisfaction of patients admitted to the Emergency Centre and to determine the factors affecting the satisfaction. METHOD: A cross-sectional study was conducted over four months among patients admitted into the Emergency Centre of the hospital. Systematic sampling method was used by trained personnel who collected the data from the participants using a pre-tested structured questionnaire. RESULT: Out of 199 patients that participated, 51.3% rated the reception at the Emergency Centre as very good while the speed of pain control was rated as excellent by only 9.0% of the participants. The time to surgical intervention was rated very good and excellent by 57.3% and 9.5% respectively. Comparable value was obtained by both nurses and doctors on the overall attitude across the 5 scoring domains. Overall, 90.5% of participants were satisfied with the services and experiences at the Emergency Centre of the hospital, however, suggested areas of improvement include employment of more staff by 51.8%, provision of more equipment by 41.2%, and 27.6% requested for availability of more facilities. CONCLUSION: A high percentage of the patients were satisfied with the overall service in our Emergency Centre while some other areas require improvement.