The patients' perception of quality in surgery

The benefits of measuring patient satisfaction have been increasingly acknowledged in recent years. A range of techniques has been used including analysis of complaints made by patients and/or relatives, focus group interviews following discharge, postal and telephone surveys, face-to-face interviews and critical incident analysis. Both quantitative and qualitative methodologies are often employed in patient-satisfaction research. It is suggested that a two-tier approach of methods can increase validity and reliability (i.e. utilizing qualitative approaches in order to develop a quantitative tool). Surgery will benefit through the identification of quality benchmarks based on this type of research. There must be an emphasis on incorporating the results of patient satisfaction studies into practice and the monitoring of improvements based on the identified benchmarks.