Patient experience defines quality

Did you catch the study from Duke University's Fuqua School of Business that compared patient satisfaction surveys with clinical performance measures to see which is a better gauge of clinical quality? Researchers measured 30-day readmission rates at roughly 2,500 hospitals and found that patient satisfaction scores were linked more closely with fewer 30-day readmissions than clinical performance measures, writes Anthony Cirillo, a healthcare marketer and consultant, in a Hospital Impact blog post. What struck me was that hospitals that scored highly on patient satisfaction with discharge planning also tended to have the lowest number of patients return within a month. The authors recommended hospitals wishing to improve their clinical performance focus on improving the interactions between patients and hospital staff. --To learn more, read the full blog post on Hospital Impact.