C Rajendran

While underscoring the importance of customer (patient) satisfaction in fostering efficient delivery of healthcare services, researchers from the developed world explored the whole gamut of influencing factors, ranging from empathy of physicians and hospital infrastructure to courtesy of paramedical staff and hospital image. The hospitals in the developing world present distinct business models and service quality variations that warrant context-specific examination. In the Indian healthcare system, patients are always accompanied by their attendants who perform a plethora of functions, including facilitating the execution of physicians' recommendations. In many Indian hospitals the presence of an attendant is perceived more as an institutional norm than a personal convenience. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the moderators and mediators in the context of healthcare service quality from the perspectives of patients and their attendants in India. The study employs a questionnaire-survey approach to obtain the perceptions of patients and attendants. The study reveals that attendants play an indispensable role in Indian context. Attendants provide physical and mental support to patients, which result in patients' satisfaction with the hospital's services. Further, attendants, by supplementing hospital activities, serve as a bridge between service providers and patients. The attendants have been found to subordinate their own personal comfort levels to the care provided by the hospital to the patients. The current research is the earliest study that explicitly addresses the role of attendants in the context of healthcare service delivery in India.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to provide strategic recommendations to Indian hospital administrators for improving service quality by analysing performance dimensions and the importance attached to them by patients and attendants. Design/methodology/approach – Patient and attendant perceptions were collected using a questionnaire. Findings – Patients and attendants have different perceptions. Different customers have different needs of which providers need to be aware to better serve their consumers. Research limitations/implications – The study captured only 408 patient and attendants’ perceptions – a 32 per cent response rate. Practical implications – Results enable hospital administrators to develop appropriate strategies to improve their structure and function by analysing their strengths and weaknesses regarding their tangible and intangible assets. Originality/value – The study included attendants, specifically in an Indian healthcare context.

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to conceptualize hospital service quality (SQ) into its component dimensions from the perspectives of patients and their attendants; and to analyze the relationship between SQ and customer satisfaction (CS) in government and private hospitals in India. Design/methodology/approach: The study employs questionnaire-survey approach to obtain the perceptions of patients and attendants. The instruments developed have been validated using tests for reliability, validity and uni-dimensionality. Data collected have been analyzed by using statistical techniques such as bi-variate correlation and multiple regression. Findings: Patients and attendants treat the interpersonal aspect of care as the most important one, as they cannot fully evaluate the technical quality of healthcare services. The study also revealed that the hospital service providers have to understand the needs of both patients and attendants in order to gather a holistic view of their services. Research limitations/implications: Results of the study are dependent on the nature and number of respondents, i.e. the study has captured only the perceptions of service receivers - patients and attendants; and sample size of the study - 204 patients and 204 attendants - due to limited response rate and other operational constraints. Practical implications: The present study allows the hospital administrators to benchmark their hospitals with those of their competitors by comparing the mean values of the dimensions of SQ. The study also allows a comparison of the performance of government and private hospitals in terms of the services offered. Originality/value: The study conceptualizes hospital SQ as an eight-dimensional framework. Further, it also presents the relationship between SQ and CS in Indian Government and private hospitals. © Emerald Group Publishing Limited.