Corruption

International Journal for Quality Research 8(3) 447-460
ISSN 1800-6450

Kanwal Nasim1
Saquib Yusaf Janjua

Article info:
Received 22.08.2014
Accepted 4.09.2014
UDC – 638.124.8

SERVICE QUALITY PERCEPTIONS AND
PATIENTS' SATISFACTION: A
COMPARATIVE CASE STUDY OF A PUBLIC
AND A PRIVATE SECTOR HOSPITAL IN
PAKISTAN
Abstract: Management of hospitals should take initiatives to
improve the overall service quality of patient care. Regular
feed-back from patients should be taken and rules should be
made considering the expectations and requirements of
patients. This study attempts to examine the satisfaction of
patients from service quality they received from hospitals.
Moreover, satisfaction is measured in both public and private
hospital.
Keywords: Service Quality, Hospitals, Patients' Satisfaction,
Pakistan

1. Introduction1
In a developing country like Pakistan,
healthcare is a serious concern and a point to
ponder about for practitioners, researchers
and government officials. A variety of steps
have been taken by government of Pakistan
and management of hospitals to improve the
quality of patient care in hospitals. Now the
question arises, what is quality care? Quality
care is defined as, “the degree to which
health services for individuals and
populations increase the likelihood of
desired health outcomes and are consistent
with current professional knowledge”. It is
also defined as, “the totality of features and
characteristics of a service that bear on its
ability to satisfy a given need” (Bauer JE,
Duffy GL, Westcott).
It is the right of ill people to get better health
services. For this purpose, it is the basic
1

Corresponding author: Kanwal Nasim
email: kanwal.naseem@gmail.com

responsibility of government to provide its
people with best health care facilities at
affordable price. As healthy people can
contribute to country's progress and ailing
nation makes a country unsuccessful.
In Pakistan, both private...