Measuring perceived quality of health care services in India

Purpose - The objective of this paper is to understand the perception of patients towards health care services in Lucknow based on the 20-item scale Design/methodology/approach - The 20-item scale was administered to 500 users of health care centres comprising a tertiary health centre, a state medical university and two missionary hospitals in Lucknow, India. Findings - The scale was found to be reliable to a great extent with an overall Cronbach alpha value of 0.74. "Health personnel and practices" and "health care delivery" were found to be statistically significant in impacting the perception. Respondents were relatively less positive on items related to "access to services" and "adequacy of doctors for women". The tertiary health centre was rated poorer than the medical university and missionary hospitals. Research limitations/implications - This tool may be applied for qualitative assessment of the services of health care programmes as well as health care centres of India. Practical implications - The paper draws the attention of health policy makers in considering the requirements and opinions of patients to effect substantial change and significant improvement in the quality of the health care services for better and increased utilization of the services. Originality/value - The paper fulfils the need of measuring perceived quality of health care services and points out that the improvement in health care services requires immediate and urgent attention from policy makers.