Dental service satisfaction in dental health centers in Erbil city, Iraq

Aim: This research was designed with the purpose of investigating patient satisfaction with dental services and the factors affecting it. Methods: In a cross-sectional study, the satisfaction of 570 patients (58.1% female) referred to three dental health care centers in Erbil/Kurdistan region of Iraq. Satisfaction was assessed in the sub-constructors of dentists' performance, clinical setting, accessibility to dental care, reception area and staffs, and an overall satisfaction. Satisfaction was rated in a Likert scale. Results: In all of the sub-constructors, at least half of the individuals were in satisfied and partially satisfied group. 70.4% of patients were satisfied with reception area (sum of satisfied and strongly satisfied). Moreover, the satisfaction rate was 65.5% with clinical settings and 62.7% with reception staff. Multivariant analysis showed that dentists' performance (coefficient = 0.100; p <0.0001), clinical setting (coefficient = 1.337; p <0.0001), accessibility (coefficient = 0.191; p <0.0001) and reception area (coefficient = 0.137; p <0.0001) have a significant correlation with overall score. Conclusion: The findings demonstrated that more than fifty percent of patients were satisfied with overall dental services. Dentists' performance, clinical setting, accessibility and reception area are the most important factors that influence the overall satisfaction.