Level of empowerment of hospitalized patient in Taiwan clinical practice

In the health-care system within hospitals, Taiwanese patients usually play the role of passively cooperating with health-care professionals. Therefore, patients rarely make their own treatment decisions. This study evaluated the level of patient education and patient satisfaction in relation to empowerment level in Taiwan.

A cross-sectional survey by a self-administered structured questionnaire was carried out with 618 inpatients from the four hospitals. Statistical analyses were then conducted. Analysis of covariance and post-hoc comparison was used to compare differences between the level of patient empowerment, age, and education as covariates in the model.

This study found that 21.2% and 35.6% of participants were highly empowered and well empowered, respectively. Years of education is a significant covariate in the counselling domain of patient education. Even after controlling for age and education level, the counselling, answer question and justifying action, providing information scores remain significant for all levels after adjusting for the effects of degree of patient empowerment. Patients with higher empowerment also having more-sufficient patient education, indicating a tendency toward higher patient satisfaction. Patient education and counselling practices in Taiwan's clinical practice could be improved to enhance patient empowerment and ensure health-care systems are person-centred.

To move more toward highly patient empowerment, we suggest that health-care professionals advocate a patient-empowerment approach and to provide more counselling related to patients' illnesses and possible treatments.