ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Psychiatry, 09 February 2023

Sec. Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Rehabilitation

Volume 14 - 2023 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1090892

A comparison of patient-reported quality between inpatient services for mental and physical health: A tertiary-hospital-based survey in China

  • 1. Research Center for Public Health and Social Security, School of Public Administration, Hunan University, Changsha, Hunan, China

  • 2. Xiangya School of Public Health, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China

  • 3. Clinical Nursing Teaching and Research Section, The Second Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China

  • 4. National Clinical Research Center for Metabolic Diseases, Department of Metabolism and Endocrinology, The Second Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China

Article metrics

View details

1

Citations

1,9k

Views

747

Downloads

Abstract

Background:

It is widely acknowledged that quality of mental health services is routinely worse than physical health services across countries. However, studies separately investigating mental health services often report high-level satisfaction, even comparing with physical health services. Therefore, this study aimed to compare patient-reported quality between inpatient services for mental and physical health in China.

Methods:

An inpatient survey was conducted among service users of mental and physical health services. Patient-reported quality was measured by the responsiveness performance questionnaire after patient discharge and based on patients' multiple experiences of hospitalization in the past 3 years. Chi-square tests were performed to compare the two patient groups' ratings on inpatient services for mental and physical health, and multivariate logistic regression was performed to adjust covariates in the group comparison.

Results:

Inpatient services for mental health were rated better than those for physical health on “treating with respect” (AOR = 3.083, 95% CI = 1.102–8.629) and “choosing a healthcare provider” (AOR = 2.441, 95% CI = 1.263–4.717). However, mental health services had poorer ratings on “asking patient's opinions” (AOR = 0.485, 95% CI = 0.259–0.910). For other responsiveness items, no significant difference was detected between the two types of inpatient services.

Conclusion:

Mental health inpatient services provided by China's tertiary hospitals could perform as well as physical health inpatient services in most aspects and even better perform regarding dignity and choice of healthcare providers. However, neglecting patients' voices is more severe in inpatient services for mental health.

Introduction

Due to lower priority, insufficient funding and inadequate human resources for mental health, the quality of mental health services is routinely worse than that of physical health services across countries (14). Many patients with severe mental disorders sometimes experience even poorer care associated with abuses of their human rights (1, 2).

However, studies on mental health services often report a high level of patient satisfaction (5, 6), even in comparison with that in studies on physical health services. For example, a survey conducted in 57 hospitals in five European countries reported that the mean score of patient satisfaction with psychiatric inpatient care was 7.29 ± 2.16 out of 10 (7). A systematic review on psychiatric inpatient services also found good patient satisfaction in most studies, with a mean satisfaction score of 23.53 out of 32 or a satisfaction proportion range between 60% and 68% (8). In contrast, a multi-country survey involving 488 hospitals in eight European countries and 617 hospitals in the United States showed that high patient satisfaction ratings for physical health services ranged only from 35% to 61% (9).

In China, mental health services also suffer from insufficient resources and inequitable distribution of resources (10, 11). Before the release of the National Mental Health Law in 2012, the psychiatric institutions in China were even criticized by the international community for right violations of psychiatric patients (12, 13). Even though, a national survey among inpatients from 32 psychiatric hospitals reported a mean satisfaction score of 23.3 ± 2.4 out of 25 (6). In comparison, another national survey on patient satisfaction of physical health services reported an overall score of 7.61 ± 2.12 out of 10 for inpatient care (14).

Due to differences in study designs, care settings, assessment instruments and scoring methods, comparison based on the above studies can hardly provide a reliable conclusion to questions of whether and how much quality gap exists between services for mental and physical health. Therefore, we designed an inpatient survey to compare patient-reported quality between services for mental and physical health in the context of China. The inter-sectoral comparison could better detect problems existing in mental health services and inform quality improvement accordingly.

Methods

Study design and setting

A cross-sectional survey was designed under the recommended checklist of STROBE (Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology) for cross-sectional studies, including study design, setting, participants, variables and measurement and study size (15).

The survey was conducted from 1st June and 31st July, 2018 among service users of mental and physical health services, who were consecutively recruited from the inpatient wards of the Psychiatric Department (PD) and the Endocrinology Department (ED) in one of the largest public tertiary general hospitals in Changsha, the capital city of Hunan Province, China. The PD had 150 mental health professionals and 6 inpatient wards with 231 beds, providing services for approximately 130,000 outpatients and 4,200 inpatients per year for surrounding cities and rural areas. The ED had 121 medical professionals and 3 inpatient wards with 126 beds, with patient volume of over 110,000 (outpatient) and 4,000 (inpatient) person times per year. The ED was chosen for comparison for two reasons: (1) the majority of patients in the ED were diagnosed with chronic physical illnesses, such as diabetes mellitus and metabolic disorder. Like patients from the PD, they also had multiple encounters with health care throughout their treatment lasting for years. (2) Apart from the chronic nature of patients' medical conditions, both the ED and PD were ranked as the top clinical departments in the selected hospital, which were also comparable at the sector level.

Participants

Eligible patients were 18 years old or above; mentally and physically capable of completing interviews according to their clinical records; discharged between 1st June and 31st July in 2018. Patients were excluded, if they were: (1) admitted to the PD for substance abuse only; (2) unwilling to receive a post-discharge telephone survey.

An a priori sample size calculation was determined according to the formula for comparing two population proportions: n = . Here α was set as 0.05 at a confidence level of 95%, and β was set as 0.2 for a power of 80%. Based on previous studies (8, 9), the expected satisfaction proportions mental health services (p1) and physical health services (p2) were set as 65% and 48% respectively. For the comparison, we calculated a minimal sample size of 130 users for each type of services.

Study variables and measures

Patient-reported quality of inpatient services

Patient-reported quality, as the dependent variable, was measured by the concept of responsiveness proposed by the World Health Organization (WHO) (16). As an alternative to patient satisfaction, responsiveness only focuses on a healthcare system's performance of non-medical aspects (17). As responsiveness could describe healthcare quality apart from positive health outcomes and non-impoverishment (18), it was particularly appropriate for quality assessment across sectors and types of diagnosis (17, 19). The responsiveness performance questionnaire, the operationalized instrument for measuring responsiveness, had been widely validated and used in evaluations on physical and mental health services (17, 18, 2023). The 15-item questionnaire assesses eight domains: dignity, confidentiality, communication, autonomy, choice, social support, quality of basic amenities, prompt attention (22). Each item was rated on a five-point scale, with higher ratings indicate better responsiveness performance. To maximally cover multiple service providers, participants from the PD and ED were asked to rate based on their inpatient experiences of mental and physical health services in the past 3 years, rather than their last experiences in the survey hospital.

Covariates

  • (1) Social-demographic and clinical characteristics: A self-designed questionnaire was used to collect each participant's age, gender, marital status, education, employment, diagnosis, treatment years and hospitalization experiences in different hospitals, which were frequently tested and reported as determinants of patient-reported healthcare quality in previous studies (6, 8, 24).

  • (2) Reporting behaviors on healthcare quality: As self-reported measures were prone to personal biases in reporting styles, participants' reporting behaviors on responsiveness were measured by vignettes (25). Eight vignettes were selected from the World Health Survey and the WHO Study on Global Ageing and Adult Health (SAGE) (2007–2008). The selection, translation and adoption process and full texts of the eight vignettes used in this study was reported elsewhere (26). In brief, each vignette provided one scenario of people's experiences with health services to test one responsiveness domain that corresponded to the responsiveness performance questionnaire. Respondents' ratings on the vignettes served as a judging benchmark of their responsiveness ratings on experiences. In the present study, significantly different reporting behaviors were detected between patients from the PD and ED on several responsiveness performance items (Appendix 1 in Supplementary material).

Data collection

The study was approved by the Institutional Review Board of the Xiangya School of Public Health, Central South University (XYGW-2018-01). Potentially eligible patients were approached at bedside on the day or 1 day before patient discharge. After explaining the study purpose and procedures, written informed consent was obtained from all participants before data collection.

To minimize the influences of hospitalization status on patients' ratings on responsiveness (27), the data collection process was divided into two stages: (1) a face-to-face survey on the day or 1 day before patient discharge, which collected participants' social-demographic and clinical information and reporting behaviors on healthcare quality; (2) a telephone survey within 1 week after patient discharge, which collected patient-reported quality of inpatient services. Measures, including asking participants' call time preference and sending notifying text messages in advance, were used to increase the response rate in the second stage. Participant recruitment and both stages of surveys were conducted by postgraduates with a background in public health.

Data analysis

Group differences of social-demographic and clinical characteristics were compared between patients from the PD and ED, by chi-square tests or Mann–Whitney U tests. In accordance with WHO's approach in the Multi Country Service Study, ratings of the responsiveness performance questionnaire were dichotomized into “good performance” (ratings ≥ 4) and “poor responsiveness performance” (ratings ≤ 3) (20). Chi-square tests were performed to identify rating differences of inpatient experiences between mental and physical health services. For each responsiveness performance item, a multivariate binary logistic regression model was performed to adjust covariates in the group comparison between the PD and ED. Adjusted odds ratio (AOR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) were reported. No missing data were replaced. All analyses were performed in SPSS 23.0 and statistical significance level was set as 0.05.

Results

Participant characteristics

Overall, we approached 298 patients from PD and 211 patients from ED; 234 patients from the PD and 181 from the ED completed the face-to-face survey; 168 patients from the PD and 132 patients from the ED finished the telephone survey. In both departments, participants retained in the post-discharge telephone survey were younger and more likely to be employed (P < 0.05) (Appendix 2 in Supplementary material).

Comparative analyses (Table 1) between patients from the two departments yielded nonsignificant results in gender and employment status; however, patients from the PD were younger (P < 0.001), less likely to be married (P < 0.001) or treated in multiple hospitals (P < 0.001), had higher educational level (P < 0.001) and shorter years of treatment (P = 0.005). Among patients from the PD, 20.1% of them were diagnosed with schizophrenia-spectrum disorders, 46.9% with mood disorders, 18.9% with anxiety disorders. For patients from the ED, 65.7% of them were diagnosed with diabetes mellitus, 13.1% with metabolic bone disease, and 6.8% with hypofunction and other disorders of pituitary gland.

Table 1

VariablesPatients from the PD (n = 168)Patients from the ED (n = 132)P*
Age, mean, median (IQR)35.3, 32 (23, 47)53.3, 55 (43, 65)<0.001
Male, n (%)83 (49.4)66 (50.0)0.918
Marital statusa, n (%)<0.001
   Married90 (53.6)102 (77.3)
   Unmarried78 (46.4)30 (22.7)
Education, n (%)<0.001
   ≤Primary school11 (6.5)42 (31.8)
   Junior high school39 (23.2)33 (25.0)
   Senior high school50 (29.8)28 (21.2)
   ≥University68 (40.5)29 (22.0)
Employmentb, n (%)0.293
Employed69 (41.1)46 (35.1)
Unemployed99 (58.9)85 (64.9)
Years of treatment, mean, median (IQR)3.0, 1 (0, 5)6.8, 2 (0, 11)0.005
Hospitalization in multiple hospitals in past 3 years, n (%)50 (29.9%)66 (50.0%)<0.001

Participant characteristics.

IQR, interquartile range.

*

P value by χ2 tests or Mann–Whitney U tests.

a

Married includes married and cohabited, unmarried includes single, divorced, and widowed.

b

Employed includes employed and self-employed, unemployed includes unemployed and retired.

Comparison of patient-reported quality between mental and physical health services

Table 2 presents results of chi-square tests on responsiveness performance ratings on inpatient services for mental and physical health. Compared to the ED patients' ratings on physical health services, significantly fewer patients from the PD rated mental health services as “good performance” on the following items: (1) “information of alternative treatments or tests” (PD = 27.9%, ED = 41.1%; P = 0.017), from the domain of autonomy; (2) “asking users' opinions when making decisions” (PD = 42.7%, ED = 55.0%; P = 0.036), also from the domain of autonomy; (3) “family/friend visits during hospitalization” (PD = 90.8%, ED = 97.7%; P = 0.016), from the domain of social support. However, mental health services were more frequently rated as “good performance” than physical health services on “treating with respect” from the domain of dignity (PD = 94.0%, ED = 86.4%, P = 0.023) and on “choosing a healthcare provider” from the domain of choice (PD = 64.6%, ED = 51.6%, P = 0.026). For the other 10 items, no significant difference of patients' ratings was detected between mental and physical health services.

Table 2

Domain/itemMental health servicesaPhysical health servicesaChi-square/dfP
n(%)n(%)
Domain: Dignity
 Q1. Treating with respect158 (94.0)114 (86.4)5.158/10.023
 Q2. Physical privacy during examination and treatments149 (89.8)113 (86.3)0.863/10.353
Domain: Confidentiality
 Q3. Talking privately, without overhearing53 (31.9)30 (22.9)2.963/10.085
 Q4. Keeping patient information confidential148 (89.2)111 (86.0)0.655/10.418
Domain: Communication
 Q5. Communication understandable139 (82.7)114 (87.0)1.038/10.308
 Q6. Enough time for questioning135 (80.4)99 (76.2)0.768/10.381
Domain: Autonomy
 Q7. Information of alternative treatments or tests46 (27.9)53 (41.1)5.654/10.017
 Q8. Asking patient's opinions when making decisions70 (42.7)71 (55.0)4.416/10.036
Domain: Choice
 Q9. Choosing a healthcare provider104 (64.6)65 (51.6)4.941/10.026
Domain: Social support
 Q10. Family/friend visits during hospitalization148 (90.8)125 (97.7)5.812/10.016
 Q11. Contacting with outside during hospitalization150 (92.6)125 (97.7)3.738/10.053
Domain: Quality of basic amenities
 Q12. Cleanliness of inpatient wards155 (93.4)115 (89.8)1.201/10.273
 Q13. Overall comfortableness of inpatient wards149 (89.8)112 (87.5)0.370/10.543
Domain: Prompt attention
 Q14. Traveling time to hospital65 (39.6)57 (45.6)1.035/10.309
 Q15. Waiting time of being admitted99 (62.7)73 (58.9)0.419/10.518

Comparison of responsiveness performance ratings between mental health and physical health inpatient services.

a

Rating as “good performance.”

After controlling cofounders from participants' social-demographic and clinical characteristics and reporting behaviors on healthcare quality, responsiveness performance ratings remained significantly different between the two types of services on three items (Table 3). Specifically, mental health services were more likely to be rated as “good performance” than physical health services on “treating with respect” from the domain of dignity (AOR = 3.083, 95% CI = 1.102–8.629, P = 0.032) and “choosing a healthcare provider” from the domain of choice (AOR = 2.441, 95% CI = 1.263–4.717, P = 0.008). However, “asking user's opinions when making decisions” from the domain of autonomy tended to have poorer performance in mental health services (AOR = 0.485, 95% CI = 0.259–0.910, P = 0.024).

Table 3

Domain/itemAOR (95% CI)P
Domain: Dignity
   Q1. Treating with respect3.083 (1.102–8.629)0.032
   Q2. Physical privacy during examination and treatments1.634 (0.593–4.505)0.343
Domain: Confidentiality
   Q3. Talking privately, without overhearing1.441 (0.704–2.950)0.318
   Q4. Keeping patient information confidential1.311 (0.502–3.421)0.580
Domain: Communication
   Q5. Communication understandable0.873 (0.358–2.132)0.766
   Q6. Enough time for questioning1.746 (0.801–3.807)0.161
Domain: Autonomy
   Q7. Information of alternative treatments or tests0.612 (0.325–1.151)0.128
   Q8. Asking patient's opinions when making decisions0.485 (0.259–0.910)0.024
Domain: Choice
   Q9. Choosing a healthcare provider2.441 (1.263–4.717)0.008
Domain: Social support
   Q10. Family/friend visits during hospitalization0.192 (0.021–1.755)0.144
   Q11. Contacting with outside during hospitalization0.208 (0.025–1.697)0.143
Domain: Quality of basic amenities
   Q12. Cleanliness of inpatient wards1.499 (0.505–4.443)0.466
   Q13. Overall comfortableness of inpatient wards1.733 (0.686–4.382)0.245
Domain: Prompt attention
   Q14. Traveling time to hospital1.395 (0.739–2.636)0.305
   Q15. Waiting time of being admitted1.425 (0.747–2.719)0.282

Multivariate logistic regression analysis to control confounders in quality comparison between mental health and physical health inpatient services.

Physical health services were set to be the reference group.

Discussion

To our best knowledge, this study was the first attempt to compare quality and detect gaps between mental and physical health services based on patient assessment. In addition, we recruited inpatients from two clinically matched departments from the same hospital; surveys in the two departments were administered with the same instruments and under the same interview procedures. This tackles the problem of comparability across existing studies, which separately investigated patient satisfaction of mental or physical health services with different study designs, settings and assessment instruments (69, 14, 27, 28).

The participants reported that mental health services performed as well as physical health services on 12 responsiveness performance items of 5 domains (confidentiality, communication, social support, quality of basic amenities and prompt attention). This is different from the existing knowledge that the quality of mental health services is routinely worse than physical health services (1). The results of non-inferiority between the two types of services could be attributed to two potential explanations. Firstly, as the two clinical departments were selected from the same hospital, there were institutionally standardized training schemes for service providers' practices (like communication with patients), same regulations on hospital management (like visiting regulations and admission procedures) and similar basic amenities in inpatient wards. The institutional-level consistency could promote the consistency of patients' experiences. Secondly, the Chinese government has been committed to strengthening the mental health system since 2000 (29, 30). A series of national policies has been released to improve mental health services, which include the Guidelines for the Development of National Mental Health Care System (2008–2015) and the Plan for Construction and Development of Mental Health Care System (2010) (11, 31). Specifically to hospital-based services, the Proposal on Construction Mental Health Institutions (2008) and its special funds of the grant by the central government has greatly improved the infrastructure of mental health institutions across China (32); the National Mental Health Law (2012) has provided comprehensive regulations on treatment of mental disorders and rights protection of patients (33); the National Project of Specialty-Transfer Training to be Psychiatrists since 2015 has largely scaled up mental health services (34). In our study, as inpatient experience in multiple hospitals was included as a covariate in the multivariate regression analyses, it also indicated that the non-inferiority of patient assessment between mental and physical health services was on a larger scale beyond a single hospital.

Though 86.4% patients from the ED rated physical health services as “good performance” on “treating with respect” (Domain: Dignity), mental health services outperformed physical health services on this item both before and after covariate adjustment. On one hand, this could be regarded as a positive result of the implementation of the National Mental Health Law (2012), which advocates human dignity and right protection of patients with mental disorders (35). On the other hand, this might also be related to the difference of tools and methods for diagnosing and treating mental disorders and physical diseases. In general, services for physical health more rely on biochemical tests and techniques. In addition to biochemical techniques, symptom examination, counseling and psychotherapy are also very important clinical practices in psychiatry. The above clinical practices require professionals to better understand patients and create clinical relationships (36), which might provide extra comfort to patients' feelings and promote their feeling of be respected.

For the domain of choice, mental health services also had better performance than physical health services both before and after covariate adjustment. This indicates that patients with mental disorders could more often access to inpatient services provided by hospitals or clinicians they are happy with than their counterparts with chronic physical conditions. Without a strict referral system, patients in China could go directly to any hospital as they wish (37); therefore, hospital capacity and healthcare utilization of patients are key to the domain of choice. By the end of 2018, there were 569,031 and 1,639,053 hospital beds for psychiatry and internal medicine, respectively (38). The China National Health Services Survey of 2018 reported that the rates of hospital admission were 0.8‰ for mental and behavioral disorders and 5.8‰ for endocrine, nutritional and metabolic diseases (39). Despite fewer mental health resources, much lower utilization of care among patients with mental disorders in China (3941) makes mental health services seemingly more available for choice than physical health services.

After covariate adjustment, “asking patient's opinions when making decisions” (Domian: Autonomy) was the only item with poorer patient assessment on mental health services than on physical health services (AOR = 0.024; 95% CI = 0.259–0.910). The problem of neglecting voices of patients with mental disorders in medical decision-making were consistently reported in previous studies in China (4247). One major reason is the prevailing concern on patients' insight (48). As a result, family members tend to play a more important role than patients themselves in informed consent and shared decision in China' psychiatric setting (42, 4447).

Value and implications of the research

This research has been an important addition to the literature on mental health services both in China and globally. On one hand, our results have demonstrated that mental health services are able to be provided with non-inferior or even better quality than physical health services in the real world. On the other hand, based on the inter-sectoral comparison, our findings would be helpful for informing quality improvement in mental health services.

Our results demonstrated that neglecting patients' voice in medical decision-making was more severe in mental health services. Though some recent studies have reported preference for shared decision-making among patients mental disorders in China (43, 48), how to implement share decision-making in psychiatric setting is still unclear with several challenges (42, 49). Therefore, implementation research to support shared decision-making in routine mental health is needed and the future quality improvement program of mental health services should place more efforts on protecting patients' right of shared decision-making.

Limitations

The participant recruitment was conducted in one of the best tertiary hospitals in middle south part of China and patients from both departments had a higher socio-economic status than the average population level in China (50). As socio-economic status has a significant relationship with healthcare-seeking behavior (51, 52), participants for the present study are more likely to utilize health services provided by high-quality hospitals, like the survey hospital. Therefore, though 29.9% patients from the PD and 50.0% patients from the ED had inpatient experiences in multiple hospitals, our findings should be cautiously generalized to comparison between mental and physical health services at tertiary level only, rather than the whole system covering services at lower levels. Future comparison between the two types of services should be conducted in an extended scale, covering healthcare providers at different levels in China.

Meanwhile, there was a potential recall bias, as the time frame of the responsiveness performance questionnaire was set to be the past 3 years. However, this was a compromise, in order to maximally capture patients' multiple healthcare encounters and to report quality of inpatient services beyond one hospital.

Conclusion

Our study reveals that mental and physical health inpatient services provided by China's tertiary hospitals could have similar patient-reported quality, regarding confidentiality of personal information, communication with patients, social support during hospitalization, quality of basic amenities and prompt provision of healthcare. Mental health services could even outperform physical health services on patients' dignity in clinical interaction and patients' choice of healthcare providers. However, the problem of neglecting patients' voice in medical decision-making is more severe in mental health services than physical health services.

Statements

Data availability statement

The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article will be made available by the authors, without undue reservation.

Ethics statement

The studies involving human participants were reviewed and approved by Institutional Review Board of the Xiangya School of Public Health, Central South University (XYGW-2018-01). The patients/participants provided their written informed consent to participate in this study.

Author contributions

WZ and SX conceptualized the study. WZ and BL collected the data. WZ, GX, and FO analyzed the data. WZ wrote the manuscript. All authors reviewed the manuscript.

Funding

This work was supported by the National Social Science Foundation of China (Grant number: 21&ZD125).

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher’s note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Supplementary material

The Supplementary Material for this article can be found online at: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1090892/full#supplementary-material

References

  • 1.

    PatelVSaxenaSLundCThornicroftGBainganaFBoltonPet al. The Lancet Commission on global mental health and sustainable development. Lancet. (2018) 392:155398. 10.1016/S0140-6736(18)31612-X

  • 2.

    SaxenaSThornicroftGKnappMWhitefordH. Resources for mental health: scarcity, inequity, and inefficiency. Lancet. (2007) 370:87889. 10.1016/S0140-6736(07)61239-2

  • 3.

    SaracenoBvan OmmerenMBatnijiRCohenAGurejeOMahoneyJet al. Barriers to improvement of mental health services in low-income and middle-income countries. Lancet. (2007) 370:116474. 10.1016/S0140-6736(07)61263-X

  • 4.

    ZhouWOuyangFNerguiO-EBanguraJBAcheampongKMasseyIYet al. Child and adolescent mental health policy in low- and middle-income countries: challenges and lessons for policy development and implementation. Front Psychiatry. (2020) 11:150. 10.3389/fpsyt.2020.00150

  • 5.

    KellyELDavisLMendonSKigerHMurchLPancakeLet al. Provider and consumer perspectives of community mental health services: implications for consumer-driven care. Psychol Serv. (2019) 16:57284. 10.1037/ser0000244

  • 6.

    JiangFRakofskyJZhouHHuLLiuTWuSet al. Satisfaction of psychiatric inpatients in China: clinical and institutional correlates in a national sample. BMC Psychiatry. (2019) 19:19. 10.1186/s12888-019-2011-0

  • 7.

    BirdVMigliettaEGiaccoDBauerMGreenbergLLorantVet al. Factors associated with satisfaction of inpatient psychiatric care: a cross country comparison. Psychol Med. (2020) 50:28492. 10.1017/S0033291719000011

  • 8.

    WoodwardSBerryKBucciS. A systematic review of factors associated with service user satisfaction with psychiatric inpatient services. J Psychiatr Res. (2017) 92:8193. 10.1016/j.jpsychires.2017.03.020

  • 9.

    AikenLHSermeusWVan den HeedeKSloaneDMBusseRMcKeeMet al. Patient safety, satisfaction, and quality of hospital care: cross sectional surveys of nurses and patients in 12 countries in Europe and the United States. BMJ. (2012) 344:e1717. 10.1136/bmj.e1717

  • 10.

    LiangDMaysVMHwangWC. Integrated mental health services in China: challenges and planning for the future. Health Policy Plan. (2018) 33:10722. 10.1093/heapol/czx137

  • 11.

    ShiCHMaNWangLYYiLLWangXZhangWF. Study of the mental health resources in China. Chin J Health Policy. (2019) 12:517.

  • 12.

    Psychiatric institutions in China. Lancet. (2010) 376:2. 10.1016/S0140-6736(10)61039-2

  • 13.

    XiangYTYuXUngvariGSLeeEHChiuHF. China's National Mental Health Law: a 26-year work in progress. Lancet. (2012) 379:7802. 10.1016/S0140-6736(11)61704-2

  • 14.

    LiangHXueYZhangZR. Patient satisfaction in China: a national survey of inpatients and outpatients. BMJ Open. (2021) 11:e049570. 10.1136/bmjopen-2021-049570

  • 15.

    von ElmEAltmanDGEggerMPocockSJGøtzschePCVandenbrouckeJP. The Strengthening the Reporting of Observational Studies in Epidemiology (STROBE) statement: guidelines for reporting observational studies. Lancet. (2007) 370:14537. 10.1016/S0140-6736(07)61602-X

  • 16.

    WHO. World Health Report 2000: Health Systems: Improving Performance.Geneva: World Heatlh Organization (2000).

  • 17.

    ValentineNBBonselGJMurrayCJ. Measuring quality of health care from the user's perspective in 41 countries: psychometric properties of WHO's questions on health systems responsiveness. Qual Life Res. (2007) 16:110725. 10.1007/s11136-007-9189-1

  • 18.

    MurrayCJEvansDBeditors. Health Systems Performance Assessment: Debates, Methods and Empiricism.Geneva: World Health Organization. (2003).

  • 19.

    BramesfeldAStegbauerC. Assessing the performance of mental health service facilities for meeting patient priorities and health service responsiveness. Epidemiol Psychiatr Sci. (2016) 25:41721. 10.1017/S2045796016000354

  • 20.

    BramesfeldAWedegärtnerFElgetiHBissonS. How does mental health care perform in respect to service users' expectations? Evaluating inpatient and outpatient care in Germany with the WHO responsiveness concept. BMC Health Serv Res. (2007) 7:99. 10.1186/1472-6963-7-99

  • 21.

    ForouzanSPadyabMRafieyHGhazinourMDejmanMSebastianMS. Measuring the mental health-care system responsiveness: results of an outpatient survey in Tehran. Front Public Health. (2016) 3:285. 10.3389/fpubh.2015.00285

  • 22.

    ZhouWXiaoSFengCYuYWangDHuCet al. Measuring the quality of mental health services from the patient perspective in China: psychometric evaluation of the Chinese version of the World Health Organization responsiveness performance questionnaire. Glob Health Action. (2022) 15:2035503. 10.1080/16549716.2022.2035503

  • 23.

    KhanGKagwanjaNWhyleEGilsonLMolyneuxSSchaayNet al. Health system responsiveness: a systematic evidence mapping review of the global literature. Int J Equity Health. (2021) 20:112. 10.1186/s12939-021-01447-w

  • 24.

    WangWLobanEKDionneE. Public Hospitals in China: is there a variation in patient experience with inpatient care. Int J Environ Res Public Health. (2019) 16:193. 10.3390/ijerph16020193

  • 25.

    RiceNRoboneSSmithP. Analysis of the validity of the vignette approach to correct for heterogeneity in reporting health system responsiveness. Eur J Health Econ. (2011) 12:14162. 10.1007/s10198-010-0235-5

  • 26.

    LiuQZhouWNiuLYuYChenLLuoBet al. Comparison of expectations for health services between inpatients from mental health department and endocrinology department in China. Patient Prefer Adherence. (2019) 13:185160. 10.2147/PPA.S224071

  • 27.

    BoyerLBaumstarck-BarrauKCanoNZendjidjianXBelzeauxRLimousinSet al. Assessment of psychiatric inpatient satisfaction: a systematic review of self-reported instruments. Eur Psychiatry. (2009) 24:5409. 10.1016/j.eurpsy.2009.05.011

  • 28.

    YanJYaoJZhaoD. Patient satisfaction with outpatient care in China: a comparison of public secondary and tertiary hospitals. Int J Qual Health Care. (2021) 33:mzab003. 10.1093/intqhc/mzab003

  • 29.

    ZhouWYuYZhaoXXiaoSChenL. Evaluating China's mental health policy on local-level promotion and implementation: a case study of Liuyang Municipality. BMC Public Health. (2019) 19:24. 10.1186/s12889-018-6315-7

  • 30.

    LiuJMaHHeY-LXieBXuY-FTangH-Yet al. Mental health system in China: history, recent service reform and future challenges. World Psychiatry. (2011) 10:2106. 10.1002/j.2051-5545.2011.tb00059.x

  • 31.

    WongDFZhuangXYPanJYHeXS. A critical review of mental health and mental health-related policies in China: More actions required. Int J Soc Welf. (2014) 23:195204. 10.1111/ijsw.12052

  • 32.

    MaHLiuJYuX. Development and interpretation of important mental health policies in China in the past decade. Chinese Mental Health J. (2009) 23:8403.

  • 33.

    ShaoYWangJXieB. The first mental health law of China. Asian J Psychiatr. (2015) 13:724. 10.1016/j.ajp.2014.11.002

  • 34.

    WuXMMaN. Situation of specialty-transfer training to be psychiatrists from 2015 to 2020 in China. Chin Mental Health J. (2022) 36:15.

  • 35.

    ChenHPhillipsMChengHChenQChenXFralickDet al. Mental Health Law of the People's Republic of China (English translation with annotations): translated and annotated version of China's new Mental Health Law. Shanghai Arch Psychiatry. (2012) 24:30521. 10.3969/j.issn.1002-0829.2012.06.001

  • 36.

    GalasińskiD. No mental health research without qualitative research. Lancet Psychiatry. (2021) 8:2667. 10.1016/S2215-0366(20)30399-0

  • 37.

    LuCZhangZLanX. Impact of China's referral reform on the equity and spatial accessibility of healthcare resources: a case study of Beijing. Soc Sci Med. (2019) 235:112386. 10.1016/j.socscimed.2019.112386

  • 38.

    National Health Commission of China. China Health Statistical Yearbook 2019.Beijing: Peking Union Medical College Press Publishing (2019).

  • 39.

    National Health Commission of China. China Health Statistical Yearbook 2020. Beijing: Peking Union Medical College Press Publishing (2020).

  • 40.

    LuJXuXHuangYLiTMaCXuGet al. Prevalence of depressive disorders and treatment in China: a cross-sectional epidemiological study. Lancet Psychiatry. (2021) 8:98190. 10.1016/S2215-0366(21)00251-0

  • 41.

    PatelVXiaoSChenHHannaFJotheeswaranATLuoDet al. The magnitude of and health system responses to the mental health treatment gap in adults in India and China. Lancet. (2016) 388:307484. 10.1016/S0140-6736(16)00160-4

  • 42.

    HuangCLamLZhongYPlummerVCrossW. Chinese mental health professionals' perceptions of shared decision-making regarding people diagnosed with schizophrenia: a qualitative study. Int J Ment Health Nurs. (2021) 30:18999. 10.1111/inm.12771_1

  • 43.

    HuangCPlummerVWangYLamLCrossW. I am the person who knows myself best: perception on shared decision-making among hospitalized people diagnosed with schizophrenia in China. Int J Ment Health Nurs. (2020) 29:84655. 10.1111/inm.12718

  • 44.

    SuLHuangJYangWLiHShenYXuY. Ethics, patient rights and staff attitudes in Shanghai's psychiatric hospitals. BMC Med Ethics. (2012) 13:8. 10.1186/1472-6939-13-8

  • 45.

    ZhouJ-SXiangY-TZhuX-MLiangWLiHYiJet al. Voluntary and involuntary psychiatric admissions in China. Psychiatr Serv. (2015) 66:13416. 10.1176/appi.ps.201400566

  • 46.

    ZhouWXieGYuYGongHXiaoS. Patients' and family members' experiences of psychiatric inpatient services in China: a comparison based on a dyadic design. Soc Psychiatry Psychiatr Epidemiol. (2022) 57:211929. 10.1007/s00127-022-02296-w

  • 47.

    ZhouWOuyangFYuYLiYBiFXiaoSet al. Knowledge of mental health diagnosis among patients and their family members: an inpatient survey in China. J Ment Health. (2022). 10.1080/09638237.2022.2091753

  • 48.

    HuangCPlummerVLamLCrossW. Shared decision-making in serious mental illness: a comparative study. Patient Educ Couns. (2020) 103:163744. 10.1016/j.pec.2020.03.009

  • 49.

    SladeM. Implementing shared decision making in routine mental health care. World Psychiatry. (2017) 16:14653. 10.1002/wps.20412

  • 50.

    National Bureau of Statistics of China. Communiqué of the Seventh National Population Census (No. 6)—population education. China Stat. (2021) 5:113.

  • 51.

    LiXDengLYangHWangH. Effect of socioeconomic status on the healthcare-seeking behavior of migrant workers in China. PLoS ONE. (2020) 15:e0237867. 10.1371/journal.pone.0237867

  • 52.

    WangQZhangDHouZ. Insurance coverage and socioeconomic differences in patient choice between private and public health care providers in China. Soc Sci Med. (2016) 170:12432. 10.1016/j.socscimed.2016.10.016

Summary

Keywords

mental health services, physical health services, patient-reported quality, inter-sectoral comparison, inpatient services, China

Citation

Zhou W, Xiao S, Xie G, Ouyang F and Luo B (2023) A comparison of patient-reported quality between inpatient services for mental and physical health: A tertiary-hospital-based survey in China. Front. Psychiatry 14:1090892. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2023.1090892

Received

06 November 2022

Accepted

11 January 2023

Published

09 February 2023

Volume

14 - 2023

Edited by

Thomas Jamieson Craig, King's College London, United Kingdom

Reviewed by

Julie Williams, King's College London, United Kingdom; Alain Lesage, Montreal University, Canada

Updates

Copyright

*Correspondence: Bihua Luo ✉

This article was submitted to Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Rehabilitation, a section of the journal Frontiers in Psychiatry

Disclaimer

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Outline

Cite article

Copy to clipboard


Export citation file


Share article

Article metrics