A Framework For Quality Management In Healthcare: From Hospital And Patient’s Perspective

Abstract

Healthcare quality is a complex term to dissect. As several perspectives integrate to assess it, no concrete definition exists, and continuous improvement is very important to cope with the modern-day lifestyle. While many definitions, practices, sophisticated tools have been introduced to understand, measure and assess healthcare quality, the healthcare industry is still struggling to provide state-of-the-art facilities and high-quality services. One of the major findings from the literature is that healthcare quality initiatives are lacking in integrating the perspectives of the main stakeholders that contribute to reciprocation of quality of healthcare. Three main stakeholders involved in determining quality are healthcare management, medical staff and patients. In most of the initiatives, healthcare management perspective and medical staff perspective have been given more importance, but patient perception of quality is ignored. This study intends to understand the important factors of healthcare quality from patient, medical and non- medical perspectives, identify the gaps between the quality perspectives through Confirmatory Factor Analysis and suggest dimensions that can lead to improved healthcare service quality. A structured questionnaire was used to assess the importance and significance of service creation and service delivery components in determining healthcare quality through the eye of the three healthcare stakeholders. The results indicate that administrative services, resource management, job satisfaction and healthcare waste are the main components of service creation process while on the other hand; equipment availability, database, trustworthiness, and patient outcomes are the main components of service delivery in the hospitals of UAE. However, these factors should be the main point of focus in both service creation process and at the point of service delivery to improve healthcare service provided through UAE hospitals.