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This paper seeks to establish relationships between women's reproductive health service use, assessed longitudinally and by facility type, with service quality perceptions related to public or private health facilities.

The study was mainly secondary and quantitative in nature. It included analysing data collected by the International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS) and The Johns Hopkins University (JHU) as a follow‐up study to the 1998‐1999 National Family Health Survey (NFHS‐2). The follow‐up survey was carried out in Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Bihar and Jharkhand. In 2002‐2003, these four states were selected to capture socio‐economic and demographic variations. Analysis includes composite indices and logistic regression analysis. A scale was constructed to measure utilisation levels. Dimensions include: service proximity, doctor availability, waiting time, medicines, facility cleanliness, dignified treatment, privacy, service affordability and treatment effectiveness.

Findings indicate that doctor availability, waiting time, cleanliness, privacy and affordability at private health facilities enhance the probability that a health facility will be used for any reproductive health purpose. At the combined states level, medicine availability and treatment effectiveness at public health facilities enhances service use.

The major limitation is that the study includes only selected Indian states.

The findings may enhance Indian service‐quality policy.

The paper's main contribution is that seemingly for the first time in India, healthcare service use has been measured longitudinally and then explained through service quality variables by comparing public and private health facilities.

Through a literature review, this paper demonstrates that there is a lack of knowledge about quality management within the mental health services. Ideas about quality from the wider services sector are then discussed, and a case study of a mental health scenario is provided. It is argued that health services generally, and mental health services in particular, have much to gain from becoming more closely aligned with the wider field of knowledge of quality management. Concludes that the wider techniques of managing service quality may prove useful, particularly in mental health services, due to the nature of such services and their inherent variability.

To develop a framework for evaluating the quality of Portuguese health care organisations based on the relationship between customers and providers, to define key variables related to the quality of health care services based on a review of the available literature, and to establish a conceptual framework in order to test the framework and variables empirically.

Systematic review of the literature.

Health care services quality should not be evaluated exclusively by customers. Given the complexity, ambiguity and heterogeneity of health care services, the authors develop a framework for health care evaluation based on the relationship between customers (patients, their relatives and citizens) and providers (managers, doctors, other technical staff and non‐technical staff), and considering four quality items (customer service orientation, financial performance, logistical functionality and level of staff competence).

This article identifies important changes in the Portuguese health care industry, such as the ownership of health care providers. At the same time, customers are changing their attitudes towards health care, becoming much more concerned and demanding of health services. These changes are forcing Portuguese private and public health care organisations to develop more marketing‐oriented services. This article recognises the importance of quality evaluation of health care services as a means of increasing customer satisfaction and organisational efficiency, and develops a framework for health care evaluation based on the relationship between customers and providers.

Patient-centred strategies should be applied in health-care facilities management (HcFM) to guarantee service quality to meet patients’ needs and ensure quality patient health-care experience. This paper aims to examine the intervening influence of the quality of health-care administrative process (QAP) on the association between health-care facilities service quality and patients’ experiences with medical care.

A quantitative technique was used for this cross-sectional study in three Ghanaian teaching hospitals. A total of 622 relevant questionnaires were used for the analysis of the study using SEM-PLS.

The intervening influence of the QAP on the relationship between HcFM service quality (empathy and tangibility) and patients’ health-care experience (PHcE) were reinforced whilst that of reliability, responsiveness and assurance were not reinforced. The association between the QAP and PHcE was also established.

A high-quality health-care workforce (both core and supporting) and quality work environment provided by the FM department and QAP are essential during quality-of-care delivery, to reduce threats to patient safety to achieve exceptional PHcE. The constraint on the study is that information was gathered from only Ghana. Hence, the generalisation of the findings will be a challenge. Thus, in future, it is proposed that a comparative study across a developed country and a developing country can be conducted. Future research can assess the influence of the health-care internal appearance on patients’ satisfaction.

Practically, the administrative system can be improved by reducing patients overall waiting time. Steps must also be taken to reduce the problem of needless administrative tasks and practices to simplify administrative practices and improve patients’ total health-care experience (core health-care delivery and HcFM), as this influence patients’ total health-care experience.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this empirical validation is one of the initial studies in service quality and FM to examine how health-care administrative process quality affects the relationship between FM service quality and patients’ experiences with medical care. This framework can be adapted for research in different countries to extend knowledge.

As one of the five major dimensions of service quality, empathy has been and continues to be regarded as a requirement for a successful service encounter. This paper focuses on the highly customer-centric service industry of health care. The purpose of this paper is to shed light on the potential negative effects of empathy on both the physician and the patient.

Building on an in-depth review of literature and well-established service quality models, the authors propose a new model for understanding the complex role of physician empathy in the physician–patient encounter. The trait, emotional intelligence (EI), is presented as a moderator for physician empathy levels.

The Health Care Optimal Physician Empathy (HOPE) model enables further characterization and analysis of the tradeoffs between patient satisfaction and physician burnout and determining when empathy optimally works to the benefit of both the physician and the patient to maximize service quality. The HOPE model provides a systematic way to understand and determine the appropriate level of physician empathy that results in optimal outcomes for both physicians and their patients by demonstrating the tradeoffs between physician burnout and patient satisfaction.

The authors highlight the potential detrimental effects on physicians themselves, and, in turn, on service quality. The theoretical and practical implications in this paper provide insights into the development and implementation of empathy-focused interventions and best practices to optimize service quality in the physician–patient interaction. The HOPE model is the first of its kind in shedding light on the manifestation of physician empathy.

With challenges in health-care facilities management (FM) and adequacy of health-care resources constraints in most developing countries, improving patient’s health-care experience has become of strategic importance in public health-care delivery. This paper aims to investigate the mediating effect of adequacy of health-care resources on the relationship between the quality of health-care FM services and patient’s health-care experience.

This cross-sectional study adopts a quantitative approach based on a questionnaire survey conducted on 660 patients of three teaching hospitals in Ghana. In total, 622 valid questionnaires were used for data analysis using partial least squares structural equation modelling.

The mediating effect of adequacy of health-care resources on the relationship between responsiveness and tangibility and patients’ health-care experience were supported, while that of empathy, reliability and assurance were not supported. The relationship between and adequacy of health-care resources and patients’ health-care experience was also supported.

The study limitation is that it was only the teaching hospitals that were surveyed. In future studies, a comparative analysis can be conducted between both public and private hospitals. Other constructs and relationships such as the mediating effect of the quality of health-care administrative process on the relationship between FM service quality and patients’ health-care experience as well as the moderation effect of adequacy of health-care resource on the relationship between FM service quality and patients’ health-care experience can also be tested. Future studies on the same subject can use health-care workers as the respondents of the study.

The result should inspire health-care managers to prioritize attention on health-care FM to create and sustain a decent health-care environment. Facilities managers should ensure standards are not compromised by keeping health-care resources in good condition through the organisation and management of resources.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is one of the pioneer studies to test the mediating effect of adequacy of health-care resources on the relationship between patient’s health-care experience and health-care FM service quality. The proposed framework can be adapted to various sectors and countries as this empirical validation extends knowledge.

Quantitative indicators show that Bangladeshi maternal and child healthcare is progressing satisfactorily. However, healthcare quality is still inadequate. It is hypothesised that modern technology enhances healthcare quality. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to investigate how modern technology such as electronic record keeping and the internet can contribute to enhancing Bangladeshi healthcare quality. This study also explores how socio-economic and political factors affect the healthcare quality.

This paper is based on a qualitative case study involving 68 in-depth interviews with healthcare professionals, elected representatives, local informants and five focus group discussions with healthcare service users to understand technology’s effect on health service quality. The study has been conducted in one rural and one urban service organisations to understand how various factors contribute differently to healthcare quality.

The findings show that modern technology, such as the internet and electronic devices for record keeping, contribute significantly to enhancing health service transparency, which in turn leads to quality health and family planning services. The findings also show that information and communication technology (ICT) is an effective mechanism for reducing corruption and promoting transparency. However, resource constraints impact adversely on the introduction of technology, which leads to less transparent healthcare. Progress in education and general socio-economic conditions makes it suitable to enhance ICT usage, which could lead to healthcare transparency, but political and bureaucratic factors pose a major challenge to ensure transparency.

This paper can be a useful guide for promoting governance and healthcare quality in developing countries including Bangladesh. It analyses the ICT challenges that healthcare staff face when promoting transparent healthcare.

This paper provides a deeper understanding of transparency and healthcare quality in an ICT context using empirical data, which has not been explored in Bangladesh. This critical thinking is useful for policy makers and healthcare practitioners for promoting health service quality.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the key aspects of service quality within the outpatient context. The secondary aim is to compare views on quality of health service by Caucasian and non-Caucasian patients in Australia.

A mixed-method approach was adopted for this study. Qualitative data were collected from 40 patients to develop a scale for measuring health service quality. Quantitative data were collected using self-administered questionnaires available in English, Arabic, Persian, Chinese and Vietnamese. A total of 447 patients in six outpatient clinics completed the survey and data were analyzed using the structural equation modeling technique.

The qualitative findings determined eight dimensions of quality for outpatient care as follows: doctor professionalism; doctor empathy; doctor expertise; treatment outcome; staff concern; timeliness; tangibles; and operation. The quantitative findings indicated that factors related to technical aspect of care, including doctor expertise and treatment outcome were assumed the strongest predictors of overall health care quality in both Caucasian and non-Caucasian groups. Furthermore, no significant discrepancy was found between these two groups’ ratings of overall service quality and satisfaction with care.

The study captured ethnically diverse patients’ perspectives on health service quality and highlighted the significance of technical quality, which is generally neglected in service quality measures.

The purpose of this paper is to gauge the health-care services from a patient’s perspective in five private hospitals in the Syrian capital Damascus.

The five dimensions-SERVQUAL model (tangibility, empathy, assurance, reliability and responsiveness) was implemented to measure the gap between patient’s perception and expectation in health-care service quality.

The SERVQUAL tool proved to be reliable and valid in assessing service quality in Syrian health-care setting. The assessment of the service quality from a patient’s perspective shows that all SERVQUAL dimensions were negative except for tangible element that scored (+0.57) gap. Based on patient’s expectation, empathy scored the highest score with (4.37), followed by responsiveness (4.17), reliability (3.90), tangibility (3.82) and assurance (3.45). The widest negative gaps among the 22 SERVQUAL items were related to listening skills of hospital staffs (−1.52) and for spending enough time with patient (−1.81). This study indicated that tangible dimension plays a significant role in balancing the deficiency in other service quality dimensions. In addition, communication skills of medical and paramedical staff should be improved to ameliorate patient’s perception about health-care services.

This study provides valuable insights into the patient’s perception, but the feedback from hospital staffs (doctor, nurses) and hospital’s senior managers also considered potential rich information sources. This survey is conducted in the capital, and future research should include replication of this study in the other 13 Syrian governorates before generalizing the findings of this research.

Hospital administrator could use SERVQUAL model to improve their operational performance as well as to benchmark their behavior against other competitors in the health-care market in Damascus. This paper provides valuable information to policymakers and top hospital management to understand patient-centered care and to improve health-care system in Syria. Besides, this research provides a marketing insight to realize what patient expects and how she/he assesses the care service.

To the author’s knowledge, this is one of very few studies conducted to assess service quality in private health-care sector in Damascus. The main contribution of this study is providing the empirical evidence that the five dimensions-SERVQUAL scale proved to be reliable and valid instrument for measuring and analyzing health-care service quality in Syria.

The validity of an approach based on a quality system specification developed from BS5750 is considered, with reference to patient care activity in an out‐patient clinic at a general hospital. The quality systems specification is presented and the application of this system to the clinic and service departments is demonstrated.