Public healthcare satisfaction up, but wait time still a pain

SINGAPORE — Patients are happier now than they have been with public healthcare institutions in the past five years, an annual survey by the Ministry of Health shows, except when it comes to waiting time — a perennial problem.

The share of patients and caregivers rating public healthcare institutions as either “excellent” or “good” in the latest Patient Satisfaction Survey went up from 77 per cent in 2013 to 79.1 per cent last year.

Among the public hospitals — excluding Alexandra Hospital, which was scaling down operations as part of JurongHealth’s move to operate Ng Teng Fong General Hospital — patients rated Khoo Teck Puat Hospital (KTPH) their top choice to recommend to others. It also registered the largest leap in overall patient satisfaction levels, rising 6 percentage points to 86 per cent overall satisfaction.

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Tan Tock Seng Hospital (TTSH), despite its higher overall satisfaction score, registered a seven-point drop in satisfaction levels in its accident and emergency (A&E) services.

Among polyclinics, SingHealth Polyclinics improved their 2013 showing — climbing 6 percentage points to 84 per cent last year — while National Healthcare Group maintained their scores from 2013.

Across all public healthcare institutions, the issue of waiting time weighed highly on respondents’ minds. Satisfaction levels for waiting time fell short even though the vast majority gave it high importance — between 93.7 per cent and 96.3 per cent rated waiting time as either “very important” or “important”. For instance, only slightly more than half of patients (52.8 per cent) were happy with the time spent waiting to get beds and to see a doctor (58.1 per cent).

Users of public healthcare institutions TODAY spoke to said it was most grating to wait a long time to get service that lasts briefly. For example, 21-year-old Jacqueline Bong recalled waiting nearly three hours at Marine Parade Polyclinic to get a referral letter. The student said she saw the doctor for less than five minutes before she was whisked away to wait another 30 minutes to complete administrative work.

While noting that expectations on waiting times have “continually increased”, the Health Ministry acknowledged this as “an area which we need to constantly improve upon”.

A spokesperson said various initiatives have been implemented to mitigate the problem, including self-service kiosks for registration, payment and the making of appointments. Hospitals have also increased manpower and improved processes to enhance efficiency. For instance, doctors’ and nurses’ shifts are calibrated based on the anticipated patient load.

The various healthcare institutions have also rolled out measures to cut waiting times. TTSH, for instance, arranges express clinic appointments for non-critical conditions. SingHealth Polyclinics is enhancing its self-service kiosks with new features so that patients do not have to queue for counter service, including an option to pay via Medisave by next month, said chief operating officer Luna Lee.

A total of 11,371 patients and caregivers participated in the survey, which was conducted from September last year to January this year.