[Satisfaction with inpatient management. Development of a questionnaire and initial validity studies]

Area of Science:

• Health Services Research
• Psychosomatic Medicine
• Patient Experience Measurement

Context:

• Lack of validated patient satisfaction assessment tools in German inpatient healthcare.
• Need for reliable instruments to evaluate patient experiences in psychosomatic clinics.
• Adaptation of the American CSQ-Questionnaire for the German healthcare context.

Purpose:

• To develop and validate a concise and reliable questionnaire to assess patient satisfaction with inpatient psychosomatic treatment in Germany.
• To introduce the 8-item Zuf-8 questionnaire as an economical and effective measurement instrument.
• To explore the psychometric properties of the Zuf-8 through item and factor analysis.

Summary:

• A new 17-item questionnaire, adapted from the American CSQ-Questionnaire, was developed and administered to 300 psychosomatic inpatients (80% response rate).
• A shorter, 8-item version (Zuf-8) was identified as an economical and reliable instrument for measuring general patient satisfaction.
• The Zuf-8 demonstrated suitability for assessing satisfaction in psychosomatic inpatient care, with significant correlations between satisfaction scales and patient characteristics.

Impact:

• Provides a validated, cost-effective tool for German healthcare providers to measure patient satisfaction in psychosomatic settings.
• Highlights the potential of incomplete questionnaires as an indicator of underlying patient dissatisfaction.
• Contributes to improving the quality of inpatient psychosomatic care through systematic patient feedback evaluation.