The Mediating Effect of Patient Satisfaction in the Patients' Perceptions of Healthcare Quality – Patient Trust Relationship

TLDR

The study investigates how patient perceptions of healthcare quality influence satisfaction and trust, examines the mediating role of satisfaction, and tests the impact of socio‑demographic factors on these relationships. Patient perceptions of quality were assessed with a modified SERVQUAL instrument, which proved to be a consistent and reliable scale. Results show that quality perception strongly predicts satisfaction and trust, satisfaction further boosts trust and mediates the quality–trust link, socio‑demographic variables differentially affect these constructs, and private hospitals score higher in quality, satisfaction, and trust than public ones.

Abstract

The main purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between patient perception of healthcare quality,patient satisfaction, and patient trust and the mediating effect of patient satisfaction. Study aim also to test thesignificance of socio-demographic variables in determining healthcare quality, patient satisfaction, and patienttrust. Patient perception of healthcare quality was measured using modified SERVQUAL model and resultsindicate that it appears to be a consistent and reliable scale. Finding indicate that, while patient perception ofhealthcare quality has a strong and positive impact on the patient satisfaction and patient trust , patientsatisfaction has also significant impact on patient trust. Moreover, patient satisfaction appears to play animportant mediating role in increasing the strength of the association between healthcare quality and patient trustin healthcare service provider. Results confirm the varying importance of some socio-demographic variables onpatient perception of healthcare quality, patient satisfaction, and patient trust. It has also been found that privatehospitals have higher overall healthcare quality than public hospitals. Study indicate that patient of privatehospitals are more satisfied and feel more trust in healthcare service provider than public hospitals.