Q & A: Patient Surveys

Oaklawn partners with Press Ganey, a health care company that develops patient satisfaction surveys, to gather patient feedback and improve patient experience, safety, and quality. More than 41,000 healthcare facilities work with Press Ganey and their team of renowned healthcare leaders. By completing surveys, patients have a direct impact on enhancing care, ensuring their voices are heard, and fostering a more patient-centered healthcare environment.

Oaklawn is emphasizing the importance of patient’s completing these surveys and encouraging all patient’s to send in their responses. Below, Oaklawn’s Executive Director of Quality Improvement and Patient Advocate answer common questions surrounding these satisfaction surveys.

Q: Why does your hospital conduct patient surveys? 

A: Patient satisfaction surveys are required by CMS. However, even if Oaklawn was not required to ask patients for their perceptions, we would find a way to obtain this important feedback and information in order to understand how we are meeting or exceeding needs and areas where we can improve.

Q: What specific insights do you hope to gain from these surveys? 

A: In general, the patient’s perception of the care provided. What we do well and opportunities for improvement. By utilizing a standardized survey through Press Ganey, we can track and trend results while contributing to national, state, and regional benchmarking.

Q: Can you provide an example of how patient feedback has led to a tangible change in your hospital? 

A: There are so many changes that have been implemented related to the feedback from our patients. One example is significant work related to way finding and standardized signage in the hospital including color-coded elevators and main campus maps. There has also been a concentrated effort by the inpatient nursing unit to improve medication communication, discharge planning, and safety.

Q: Which aspects of patient care do you focus on in the surveys? Do you emphasize clinical care, facility conditions, staff interactions, or all of the above?  

A: We focus on all of the above. The results are shared with key stakeholders for each service, they are responsible for monitoring and taking actions as needed or for providing staff recognition for a job well done.

Q: How often do you conduct these surveys, and who are the target respondents?

A: All service lines are included  and the recipients are randomly chosen. Oaklawn has implemented a process to survey ALL ages and patients. This data as a whole is used for our internal review and response planning. Frequency is no more than one Press Ganey survey per patient every 30 days.

Q: What is the process for reviewing and analyzing patient survey responses?

A: The quality department pulls reports monthly and quarterly and pushes them to the respective department leaders including senior leadership for their review and dissemination. Each report is reviewed for trends to assist with process improvement or continuation. Survey trends are reviewed at each departments section meeting as well as the overarching Performance Improvement Committee and the Board of Directors.   

Q: Can you describe how you implement changes based on survey results? 

A: This is worked on at the department level with significant staff input as well as shared with the Patient and Family Advisory Council (PFAC) to help prioritize changes and identify opportunities for improvement from the patient perspective.

Q: How do you measure the success of these changes after implementation?

A: Success is measured via benchmarking against comparison groups from Press Ganey and through internal review such as patient feedback to the patient advocate and leadership.

Q: How do you communicate the actions taken based on patient feedback back to the patients and staff?

A: Surveys are anonymous so direct patient feedback from the survey is not possible, however we do hope that the patient will see changes when they return. Staff are communicated with via chain of command, which flows bottom to top and top to bottom.

Q: How do you ensure that the survey results accurately reflect the overall patient experience? 

A: By using a standardized survey tool via Press Ganey. Press Ganey was built with system safeguards to reduce patient bias and improve accuracy. We also monitor the sample size of results and track results over time to help determine if the result is consistent or an outlier.

Q: Do you collaborate with other departments or healthcare facilities to benchmark and compare survey outcomes?

A: Yes, each department report is compared to like departments (ED to ED) and/or can be measured to other Oaklawn departments (ED to Med/Surg). The data is benchmarked with comparison groups on a regional, state, and national level.

To share your feedback, concerns, or questions with Oaklawn watch for a Press Ganey survey to be texted to you, emailed to you, or mailed to you. If you are not a randomly selected patient for the survey but still wish to provide feedback, feel free to send us a message via our contact form on the Oaklawn website at oaklawnhospital.org/contact/ or call our Patient Advocate directly at (269) 789-8286.