Effects of Writing Down the Request for Help on Patient Satisfaction in General Practices

Study Description

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Study Description Study Design Arms and Interventions Outcome Measures Eligibility Criteria Contacts and Locations More Information

Brief Summary:

The primary objective of this study is to determine whether exploring the request for help more thoroughly improves patient satisfaction in general practice (primary care).

Condition or disease	Intervention/treatment	Phase
Patient Satisfaction; Doctor Satisfaction; Duration of Consultation	Other: Writing down request for help	Not Applicable

Detailed Description:

Patient satisfaction has been an important topic of interest in primary health care during the last decade(s). Many factors during the consultation influence patient satisfaction. One of the aspects in a consultation is the request for help; especially in primary care the request for help has been recognised as an important aspect influencing patient satisfaction. The investigators hypothesized that exploring the request for help more thoroughly would improve patient satisfaction in general practice.

Study Design

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Study Type :	Interventional (Clinical Trial)
Actual Enrollment :	209 participants
Allocation:	Randomized
Intervention Model:	Parallel Assignment
Masking:	Single (Participant)
Primary Purpose:	Health Services Research
Official Title:	Effects of Writing Down the Request for Help With Regard to Patient Satisfaction in General Practices
Study Start Date :	January 2011
Actual Primary Completion Date :	March 2011
Actual Study Completion Date :	May 2011

Arms and Interventions

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Study Description Study Design Arms and Interventions Outcome Measures Eligibility Criteria Contacts and Locations More Information

Arm	Intervention/treatment
No Intervention: Control group; Patients in the control group were asked to participate in a patient satisfaction study. They were asked to fill in a questionnaire with respect to patient satisfaction.
Experimental: Use of request card; Patients in the intervention group were told that the practice was participating in a patient satisfaction study, and they were given an envelope with information about the 'doorknob phenomenon' and a request card. The envelope for the control group only consisted of information about a patient satisfaction study, without any information on the 'doorknob phenomenon', and without a request card. Both groups received the same letter with patient information about the study.	Other: Writing down request for help; Patients in the intervention group could write down their request for help on a request card (with a maximum of 2 questions).

Outcome Measures

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Primary Outcome Measures :

1. Patient satisfaction measured with the Consultation Satisfaction Questionnaire [ Time Frame: 15-30 minutes (after the consultation patients filled in the questionnaire) ]
   The primary endpoint is the 'Professional Care' (PC) scale of the 'Consultation Satisfaction Questionnaire' (CSQ). In a previous study the score on the PC were 88.2 en 80.9 in the intervention and control groups, respectively. The standard deviations were 11.8 en 16.1. For our sample size calculation we used an expected standard deviation of 15. The sample size required to detect a difference of 7 on the PC scale between the intervention and control group, with a power of 90%, and alpha of 5% (two-tailed), and a standard deviation of 15, was 196 patients. We rounded this number off to 200.

Secondary Outcome Measures :

1. Patient satisfaction measured with the Visual Analog Scale [ Time Frame: 15-30 minutes (patients filled in the Visual Analog Scale after the consultation) ]
   On a scale of 0-10 patients could fill in the Visual Analog Scale with regard to the patient satisfaction during the consultation
2. Doctor satisfaction measured with the Visual Analog Scale [ Time Frame: 15-30 minutes (general pracitioners filled in the Visual Analog Scale after the consultation) ]
   On a scale from 0-10 general practitioners could fill in the Visual Analog Scale with regard to their own satisfaction about the consultation
3. Duration of the consultation [ Time Frame: 15-30 minutes (after the consultation the doctor measured the time with a stopwatch) ]
   Duration of the consultation was compared between both groups

Eligibility Criteria

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Ages Eligible for Study:	Child, Adult, Senior
Sexes Eligible for Study:	All
Accepts Healthy Volunteers:	Yes

Criteria

Inclusion Criteria:

• All patients with a new request for help.

Exclusion Criteria:

• Dementia
• Mental disability
• No or little knowledge of the Dutch language
• Illiteracy
• Limited vision

Contacts and Locations

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Locations

Netherlands
Isala Clinics
Zwolle, Overijssel, Netherlands, 8025 AB

Sponsors and Collaborators

Nanne Kleefstra

Investigators

Study Chair:	Henk Bilo	Medical Research Centre

More Information

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Study Description Study Design Arms and Interventions Outcome Measures Eligibility Criteria Contacts and Locations More Information

Responsible Party:	Nanne Kleefstra, MD, PhD, assistant professor, Medical Research Foundation, The Netherlands
ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier:	NCT01466140 History of Changes
Other Study ID Numbers:	EffectsPS1
First Posted:	November 7, 2011
Last Update Posted:	November 7, 2011
Last Verified:	November 2011

Keywords provided by Nanne Kleefstra, Medical Research Foundation, The Netherlands:

Patient Satisfaction; Request for help; General practice