Systematizing Complaints About Healthcare and Services at University Hospitals: Content Analysis of Patient/Family Letters

Abstract

Patient/family complaints are a valuable source of information for providing patient-oriented healthcare. This study aimed to identify and systematize patient/family complaints about healthcare services, focusing on complaints caused by “things.” A qualitative descriptive study was designed. Open data of patient and family voices published on the website of university hospital were collected from 27 hospitals for the period June 2020 to August 2020. From the collected data, we excluded praise and compliments, and complaints regarding “people.” The results revealed 1,476 complaints, with 1,755 codes. Patient/family complaints were categorized into five domains (access to hospital or line of flow in the hospital, outpatient, inpatient, facilities/equipment, publicity/documents), 46 categories, and 150 sub-categories. A total of 545 codes were excluded to avoid duplication: [1] 253 related to hardware, [2] 222 related to operations, and [3] 70 related to maintenance. This study may provide useful data to inform future studies using patient/family complaints to improve healthcare services for hospitals aiming to provide patient-centered care.