The digitization of health care is enabling providers to gain insights into patients and help them in ways that hadn’t been possible before. One shining example of that is a patient-satisfaction survey developed by Neil R. Malhotra, MD, Vice Chairman for Operations and Associate Program Director of the Department of Neurosurgery at Penn Medicine.
“A Patient’s Voice,” as the digital patient-satisfaction survey has come to be called, started as an outgrowth of that project.
Since the survey’s inception, the results have been used entirely to track the department’s performance, according to Dr. Malhotra. And the greater the sample size, of course, the greater the weight each average starts to hold. So, when he says, “Around 98 percent of our patients would recommend their neurosurgeon to a family member,” that’s a significant statement, considering it’s based on 10 years’ worth of opinions.
Where the patients are concerned, Dr. Malhotra has developed an algorithm that triggers an alert any time negative responses are given to any two of the following questions:
- Surgery went as I was told it would go?
- Surgery met my expectations?
- Am I worse than before surgery?
- Would you recommend your neurosurgeon to a family member?
In the instance of an alert, a designated clinician will follow-up directly with the individual patient. The clinician seeks to understand what drove the patients’ disappointment and, when possible, remedies the situation.
Patient Satisfaction Survey at a Glimpse
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