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APHA Scientific Session and Event Listing

Yoon-Ho Seol, PhD¹, Carole Ferrang², Genny Carrillo, MD, ScD¹, and Miguel A. Zuniga, MD, DrPH¹. (1) Department of Health Informatics, Medical College of Georgia, 1120 15th Street, Building AI-1013, Augusta, GA 30912, 706-721-3436, yseol@mcg.edu, (2) Office of Strategic Support, MCG Health, Inc., 1120 15th Street, BA-8219, Augusta, GA 30912

This study presents our ongoing efforts to develop and deploy a framework for analysis of patient satisfaction data in the context of continuing health care services over time. In our organization, patient satisfaction is measured regularly using mail survey data that provide a description of patient satisfaction levels for each service unit. This conventional use of the survey data, however, only supports a limited view of patient satisfaction across the service units.

The main objective of the research is to explore and create a unified view of patient satisfaction by considering related service units involving the patient's continuum of care needs. We examine five broad types of services: outpatient, inpatient, test and treatment, ambulatory surgery, and emergency services. From the survey data, we assess the extent of patient overlap across the service units. We then identify a potential group of patients whose survey data are meaningful for longitudinal analysis across the service units. We use a simple temporal constraint based on temporal indicators such as patient visit, admission, and discharge dates to build a longitudinal record of each patient with regard to a continuum of services.

The linkage of service units relevant across the full spectrum of patient care would enable to identify patient satisfaction from the view of continuing quality care. This session will report on the results of the analysis and address the issues related to diverse dimensions of patient satisfaction that facilitate a development of a knowledge discovery framework.

Learning Objectives: