Measuring patient satisfaction
New federal survey monitors patient experience in greater detail

High quality health care requires regular feedback to ensure that the care delivered matches the care promised. A new tool from the federal government will enable both hospitals and consumers to obtain candid information about patient satisfaction on a range of issues. The information compiled will enable hospitals to compare their performance with that of other hospitals and consumers to make informed decisions when choosing a health care provider.

This past fall, UPMC hospitals began implementing the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (H-CAHPS) patient experience survey. H-CAHPS is the new survey designed by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) to provide a standard way to measure and compare patients’ perspectives on hospital care.

The 27 H-CAHPS survey questions cover seven general categories:

• nurse communication
• doctor communication
• responsiveness of staff
• hospital environment
• pain management
• medication communication
• discharge

H-CAHPS questions ask patients very directly how often patient-focused actions occurred during their stay: always, usually, sometimes, or never. The survey also includes two general questions about the hospital: the patient’s willingness to recommend it to friends and family, and the patient’s overall rating of the hospital on a scale of 0 to 10. UPMC’s goal is for all our patients to be able to respond to these questions with “always” for the frequency of patient-focused action, a definite “yes” on the willingness to recommend to others, and a “10” for the overall rating.

The H-CAHPS questions have been integrated into the inpatient satisfaction surveys that UPMC has been conducting by mail for many years. The first few months of results are now available internally through the same reporting tools that currently exist for other patient surveys.

The H-CAHPS results also will be posted publicly on www.hospitalcompare.hhs.gov, with the first results expected in December 2007 for patients discharged between Oct. 1, 2006, and June 30, 2007.

For questions about H-CAHPS, contact Lori Gruber or Shannon Eisenberg in Corporate Planning and Marketing at 412-647-7658.

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