ABSTRACT
Improvement in the service quality system of health clinics in Malaysia had increase with the increase of national development. However, customer dissatisfaction towards regular service still has become an issue in the provision of health service in clinics throughout this country. This study aims to identify factors that influence customer satisfaction such as sociodemographic factors of patients, the location of clinic (rural or urban) and the most important SERVQUAL dimensions in determining customer satisfaction. This study conducted in October and November 2008 in Hulu Langat District. SERVQUAL questionnaires were used. Probabilistic sampling was used for the selection of respondents and the number of samples for each clinic was based on the workload of the clinic. Overall, the results showed that there are differences in levels of customer satisfaction between urban clinic (25.8%) and rural (30.7%). The most critical service quality dimensions for urban clinics are the responsiveness and reliability dimensions with a mean value of -0.7018 and -0.7434. Responsiveness, existence and reliability are the weakest quality service dimensions (mean -0.6317, -0.6718 and -0.6028) in rural clinics. It was found that customers’ ethnicity and education affect customer satisfaction in both the urban and rural clinics. Gender and type of work are factors that affect customer satisfaction only in urban clinics. Overall customer satisfaction at health clinics in Hulu Langat District is low. The difference between urban and rural clinics show the customers' needs in the area is different.
ABSTRACT
Long waiting time for elective operations is a usable key performance index of ineffi-ciency in services. A cross-sectional study for orthopedic elective surgery waiting times and their influencing factors was done in a teaching hospital, from January 2003 to June 2004; using case-mix patient’s coded records. Main outcomes measured were length of waiting time from first seen at the specialist clinic until surgery (T1) and length of waiting time from the time date of surgery was given until surgery (T2). The median waiting time for T1 was 23 weeks (5.75 months) and 5.86 weeks (1.47 months) for T2. Chi square test was significant for T1 which includes age, comorbidity but only ethnicity was significant for T2. However, multiple logistic regression showed patients paid by third party (OR) of 1.97 (95%CI:1.05-3.72) were significantly likely to wait longer than those who paid out of their own pocket. For T2, women (OR) of 2.29 (95%CI: 1.19-4.42), Indian (OR) of 2.50 (95%CI: 1.16-5.38) and who are self employed (OR) of 4.28 (95%CI: 1.23-14.97) were significantly more likely to have shorter waiting time. Thus predictors for overall waiting time are age, comorbidity, ethnicity, occupa-tion and the method of paying for services rendered by the patients