Stakeholders' experiences, perceptions and satisfaction with an electronic appointment system: a qualitative content...

Area of Science:

• Health Informatics
• Healthcare Management
• Systems Engineering

Background:

• Online appointment systems aim to overcome traditional scheduling barriers.
• Despite benefits, electronic systems present unique challenges requiring ongoing assessment.
• This study explores stakeholder experiences with an electronic appointment system to identify issues.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate stakeholder experiences, perceptions, and satisfaction with an electronic appointment system.
• To identify and categorize problems associated with the electronic appointment system.
• To inform improvements in healthcare appointment scheduling processes.

Main Methods:

• Qualitative study conducted at a specialty clinic in Iran (2022-2023).
• Systematic purposive sampling included 10 administrative users, 8 physicians, and 18 patients.
• Data collected via semi-structured face-to-face interviews and analyzed using qualitative content analysis.

Main Results:

• Problems categorized into "Planning and Management" and "Non-managerial" themes.
• Planning and management issues span national, university, and clinic levels.
• Non-managerial problems include functional and non-functional system aspects.

Conclusions:

• Electronic systems, while facilitating appointments, can cause dissatisfaction due to various factors.
• Effective planning, management, and policy are crucial for successful healthcare appointment systems.
• Unclear functional and non-functional requirements significantly challenge electronic appointment system implementation and usability.