Patient's Attitude towards the Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital's Information Services

Abstract

Objectives : To study an association between patients' demographics and their attitudes including their attitudes towards the Faculty of Medicine Siriraj Hospital' s Information Services.
Study design : Quantitative Research utilized survey questionnaires.
Subjects : Five hundred patients who received services at Siriraj Hospital during December 2003 to February 2004.
Methods : Samples were selected by availability sampling approach in order to respond the survey questionnaires. The questionnaire questions focused on demographic data, information finding and patient' s satisfaction.
Main outcome measures : Numbers and percentage of patients categorized by demographics, types of media and their information access. Numbers and percentage of patients according to level of their attitudes. Average score of patients' attitude.
Results : The findings reveal that most patients were 20 to 50 years old single female government service officers with medium income rate between 5,000 Baht who are living in central region of Thailand. They graduated bachelor' s degrees or lower education levels. Most of them are OPD patients who visited the hospital occasionally. They received information daily from television and received the hospital' s information from the "Meet Siriraj Doctors" program on the channel 7. Patients' attitude towards the faculty' s information services based on sex, age, occupation, income, education, marital status and residential status returned probability value (p) = 0.34, 0.172, 0.081, 0.4, 0.19, 0.14 and 0.73 respectively. All of these are not statistically significant. Total attitude mean score was 3.56 ranked as follows: want satisfaction on the hospital' s public relation = 3.29, easiness of language used = 3.25, overall satisfaction on information distribution process = 3.23, easy access and serve their needs = 3.02, broadness of distribution = 3.01 and opportunity to watch the television program produced by Siriraj Hospital = 2.92.
Conclusion : The survey of 500 patients representative of general population who received services at Siriraj Hospital reveals that most of their attitudes is modest. To improve Siriraj Hospital' s information services, the Faculty of Medicine needs not take patient' s demographics into account because they have no association with patient' s attitude. However, it is needed to increase the amount of information provided both generally and academically. The easier of the literature used has to be concerned. The most important strategy to make most patients understood the mission of the faculty is producing a frequent and regular TV program which has the pattern like "Meet Siriraj Doctors".