Ophthalmology Provider Ratings and Patient, Disease, and Appointment Factors

Abstract

The purpose of the current study is to examine how nonmodifiable sociodemographic, disease, appointment, management, and survey factors correlate with provider rating. This was a retrospective cross-sectional study conducted on 29 857 patient Clinician and Group Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems surveys collected from January 2017 to January 2019 at a tertiary eye center. We included surveys of patients aged 18 years or older, who answered at least 4 of 6 subfield questions, and completed the survey within 90 days of the appointment. The main outcome was the odds of receiving top box score (TBS) of 10/10 on the survey question regarding overall provider rating. The results showed that the variables with higher odds of TBS included higher overall appointment attendance (odds ratio [OR]: 2.66 [95% CI: 1.23-5.75], P = .013); older patient age (OR 2.44 [95% CI: 2.08-2.87], P < .001]; higher percentage of survey questions completed (OR: 2.02 [95% CI: 1.79-2.27], P < .001); better best corrected visual acuity (OR: 1.85 [95% CI: 1.3-2.64], P = .001); optometry clinic visit (OR: 1.25 [95% CI: 1.15-1.36], P < .001); having procedures (OR: 1.19 [95% CI: 1.04-1.36], P = .013), surgery scheduled (OR: 1.18 [95% CI: 1.03-1.36], P = .020], or refraction done (OR: 1.16 [95% CI: 1.08-1.25], P < .001); being seen by male providers (OR: 1.11 [95% CI: 1.04-1.17], P = .001); and having additional eye testing performed (OR: 1.06 [95% CI: 1.00-1.13], P = .048). Variables associated with lower odds of TBS included longer time to complete survey (OR: 0.42 [95% CI: 0.3-0.58], P = .001); new patient encounter (OR: 0.62 [95% CI: 0.58-0.65], P < .001); and glaucoma (OR: 0.66 [95% CI: 0.59-0.75], P < .001), cornea (OR: 0.79 [95% CI: 0.71-0.87], P < .001), or comprehensive clinic visits (OR: 0.86 [95% CI: 0.79-0.94], P < .001). Thus, nonmodifiable factors may affect the provider rating, and these factors should be studied further and accounted for when interpreting the results of patient experience surveys.

Patients’ Satisfaction with Ophthalmology Clinic Services in a Public Teaching Hospital

“…Vitreoretinal surgery department also increased the odds of satisfaction in the univariate analysis of Han et al but not in their multivariate analysis. 12 Interestingly, retina subspecialty clinic did not have the longest examination time in our study (Table 4). However, this was the only subspecialty clinic at the time of study that have a specialist doctor available every working day with full-time working hours and might be the reason for our specific finding suggesting the importance of specialist attendance.…”

“…[5][6][7][8][9][10] Previous studies in ophthalmology settings have been conducted around the globe with different instruments. 3,[11][12][13][14] Ideally, a standardized tool that can be used across multi-disciplines is used to enable comparison among them. The Patient Satisfaction Questionnaire Short Form (PSQ-18) is a general and relatively short satisfaction questionnaire that can be used for this purpose and has been used in ophthalmology clinics previously.…”

“…33 On the other hand, insurance type did not affect satisfaction in previous studies in ophthalmology and other settings. 8,12,34 Alternative funding should be offered to address the unsatisfied patients with no insurance in our study.…”