Evidence map›Paper›PMID 32388457›Full record

Observational studyJournal of clinical anesthesia2020

Patient satisfaction survey scores are not an appropriate metric to differentiate performance among anesthesiologists.

Robert E Freundlich, Gen Li, Brendan Grant, Paul St Jacques, Warren S Sandberg, Jesse M Ehrenfeld, Matthew S Shotwell, Jonathan P Wanderer

Open access · greenAbstract readObservational Study
In one paragraph

Observational study in Journal of clinical anesthesia, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 5 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
5citing papers in PubMed
1.3field-weighted citation impact, top 15% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

5 citing papers in PubMed, 13 citations in OpenAlex.

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4 · The record

Corrections and comments

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

8 authors at 3 institutions in 1 country.

Robert E FreundlichDepartment of Anesthesiology, Department of Biomedical Informatics, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, United States of America.
Gen LiDepartment of Anesthesiology, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, United States of America. Electronic address: gen.li@vumc.org.
Brendan GrantTulane University, United States of America.
Paul St JacquesDepartment of Anesthesiology, Department of Biomedical Informatics, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, United States of America.
Warren S SandbergDepartment of Anesthesiology, Department of Biomedical Informatics, Department of Surgery, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, United States of America.
Jesse M EhrenfeldDepartment of Anesthesiology, Medical College of Wisconsin, United States of America.
Matthew S ShotwellDepartment of Biostatistics, Department of Anesthesiology, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, United States of America.
Jonathan P WandererDepartment of Anesthesiology, Department of Biomedical Informatics, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, United States of America.
Vanderbilt University Medical Center · USMedical College of Wisconsin · USTulane University · US

Funding

Institutional Career Development CoreKL2TR002245 · NCATS · VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER · PI Julie A. Bastarache · 2017 to 2026
$9.3M
NCATS NIH HHS KL2 TR002245
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

STUDY

objectiveWith the focus of patient-centered care in healthcare organizations, patient satisfaction plays an increasingly important role in healthcare quality measurement. We sought to determine whether an automated patient satisfaction survey could be effectively used to identify outlying anesthesiologists.

designRetrospective Observational Study.

settingVanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC). MEASUREMENTS: Patient satisfaction data were obtained between October 24, 2016 and November 1, 2017. A multivariable ordered probit regression was conducted to evaluate the relationship between the mean scores of responses to Likert-scale questions on SurveyVitals' Anesthesia Patient Satisfaction Questionnaire 2. Fixed effects included demographics, clinical variables, providers and surgeons. Hypothesis tests to compare each individual anesthesiologist with the median-performing anesthesiologist were conducted. MAIN

resultsWe analyzed 10,528 surveys, with a 49.5% overall response rate. Younger patient (odds ratio (OR) 1.011 [per year of age]; 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.008 to 1.014; p < 0.001), regional anesthesia (versus general anesthesia) (OR 1.695; 95% CI 1.186 to 2.422; p = 0.004) and daytime surgery (versus nighttime surgery) (OR 1.795; 95% CI 1.091 to 2.959; p = 0.035) were associated with higher satisfaction scores. Compared with the median-ranked anesthesiologist, we found the adjusted odds ratio for an increase in satisfaction score ranged from 0.346 (95% CI 0.158 to 0.762) to 1.649 (95% CI 0.687 to 3.956) for the lowest and highest scoring providers, respectively. Only 10.10% of anesthesiologists at our institution had an odds ratio for satisfaction with a 95% CI not inclusive of 1.

conclusionsPatient satisfaction is impacted by multiple factors. There was very little information in patient satisfaction scores to discriminate the providers, after adjusting for confounding. While patient satisfaction scores may facilitate identification of extreme outliers among anesthesiologists, there is no evidence that this metric is useful for the routine evaluation of individual provider performance.

Indexed as

AnesthesiologistsPatient SatisfactionHumansOdds RatioRetrospective StudiesSurveys and QuestionnairesAnesthesiologistPatient satisfactionPerformance improvementSurvey score

Identifiers

PMID32388457
PMCPMC7387167
OpenAlexW3022259942

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceTDM
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.