Older men’s satisfaction (or dissatisfaction) with health care delivery in St Catherine, Jamaica

Paul A Bourne¹, Chloe Morris¹, Christopher AD Charles², Maureen D Kerr-Campbell³, Denise Eldemire-Shearer¹

¹Department of Community Health and Psychiatry and ²King Graduate School, Monroe College, Bronx, and Center for Victim Support, Harlem Hospital Center, New York; ³Systems Development Unit, Main Library, Faculty of Humanities and Education, The University of the West Indies, Mona, Jamaica

Abstract: Patient satisfaction and quality of life are becoming increasingly important among the more traditional clinical outcomes in the monitoring and evaluation of health care delivery. This study explored patient’s self-rated health and patient satisfaction with health care ­providers, and examined whether health care providers are a barrier to patient care. The sample consisted of 2000 men aged 55 years and older in the parish of St Catherine, Jamaica. A 132-item ­questionnaire was used to collect the data. Descriptive statistics was used to provide information about their satisfaction with the health care system. Seventy-four percent of the sample indicated good self-rated health status (excellent, 19.0%). Forty-seven percent of the sample had sought advice from a health care provider in the last 12 months; 14.1% understood the advice of the clinician, community health aide (19.9%), pharmacist (15.4%), nurse (2.1%) and nurse aide (4.6%). The respondents indicated that community health aides contributed more to improving their health (43.4%) when compared with nurses (34.8%), clinicians (17.5%), and herbalists (3.7%). Furthermore, 31.7% indicated that their medical doctors were hospitable and 4.2% were knowledgeable. Negative self-rated health, perceived lack of knowledge among doctors, lack of understanding of advice from health care providers, are just some of the factors associated with dissatisfaction of patients with chronic conditions. These findings provide a framework and foundation from which further studies on effective intervention aimed at improving the health care provider-patient relationship and service can be conducted.

Keywords: satisfaction, men, patient satisfaction, health care provider