Satisfaction with the quality and accessibility of medical care in regional healthcare: A prospective cohort longitudinal dynamic study

BACKGROUND: One of the leading indicators of the social effectiveness of healthcare is the assessment, monitoring, and analysis of the social satisfaction of patients with medical care, which reflect the degree of implementation of a personalized approach of medical care. Patients’ satisfaction with their interaction with the healthcare system is a result of the main characteristics of the quality of medical care, established by the professional community.

AIM: To analyze the satisfaction of consumers of medical services in terms of the accessibility and quality of medical care in regional healthcare facilities.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: The study involved 218 doctors from primary healthcare medical organizations in Saratov and 312 doctors from primary healthcare medical organizations in districts of the Saratov region.

RESULTS: From the results of the research, we determined negative phenomena in the activity of medical organizations in which the respondents received medical care. Despite the limitation of medical care accessibility for the majority of respondents in the regional healthcare (the absence of the necessary specialists, insufficient technical equipment in the medical organizations, the high cost of medicines unaffordable by patients, and queues), while assessing the satisfaction with medical care in the medical organizations of the region the majority of the respondents (63.8% of respondents in the medical organizations of Saratov and 64.9% in medical organizations of Saratov region) evaluated their satisfaction with medical care positively.

CONCLUSION: The explanation of the results obtained is possible in the context of the description by Academician of RAS A.V. Reshetnikov the phenomenon of “paradoxical” medicine, which appeared in the Russian healthcare literature at the end of the twentieth century.