Now in its fifth year of reporting, Discovery Health just released its annual list of 20 leading South African hospitals as rated by patients through the Patient Survey Score (PaSS). The Top 20 list is based on aggregated surveys completed by members of medical schemes administered by Discovery Health rating their in-hospital experience across various aspects of care. A total of 53 000 patients at 202 hospitals took part in the 2018 survey.
“By making a patient’s experience of care visible to the entire healthcare system, PaSS acts as a catalyst for change. This level of visibility increases accountability for changes to be made to patient care. For instance, hospitals often respond to PaSS scores by implementing improvement initiatives such as ensuring that better information is available to patients about post discharge care or that nurses listen more carefully and respond to patients’ needs,” adds Dr Moodley Naidoo.
The survey captures the following areas of patient feedback:
- How well nursing staff engage and communicate with patients;
- How well doctors engage and communicate with patients;
- How well suited the hospital environment is to the needs of patients e.g. are noise levels kept to a minimum;
- How well pain is managed;
- How clearly information about medication is shared with patients;
- Whether patients are adequately prepared for discharge e.g. are patients given information about symptoms to look out for that may indicate a need to see the doctor again; and
- An overall hospital rating including whether patients would recommend the hospital to others.
“A number of hospitals appear in the 2018 list for the fourth or fifth year in a row, and we commend them on this excellent achievement, which reflects a consistently high standard of care,” says Dr Moodley Naidoo, Head of Quality of Care at Discovery Health.
The Top 20 honours list (in alphabetical order):
- Ahmed Al-Kadi Private Hospital
- Busamed Gateway Private Hospital
- Busamed Hillcrest Private Hospital
- Busamed Lowveld Hospital
- Busamed Modderfontein Private Hospital
- Busamed Paardevlei Private Hospital
- Cormed Clinic
- Lenmed Ethekwini Hospital and Heart Centre
- Lenmed Shifa Hospital
- Life Bay View Private Hospital
- Mediclinic Hoogland
- Mediclinic Panorama
- Mediclinic Plettenberg Bay
- Mediclinic Strand
- Mediclinic Victoria
- Mediclinic Worcester
- Melomed Bellville Medical Centre
- Midlands Medical Centre
- Moot Algemene Hospital
- Zuid-Afrikaans Hospital
“We’re pleased to note that overall Patient Survey Scores have improved by 19% since we began publishing results in 2014, clearly showing that hospitals surveyed are increasingly meeting patient expectations of better care. Running the survey and publishing the results annually, has the same positive impact in our healthcare environment as observed internationally,” Dr Moodley Naidoo added.
Click here to read the Discovery Press Release.
