Consumer satisfaction with a federal health care service in Nigeria

Objective: There is the paucity of information on patients' satisfaction with psychiatric services and reduced levels of health care service delivery, in Nigeria. The aim of this study is to examine one of the dimensions of outcome, patient- satisfaction with the quality of services at the Federal Neuropsychiatric Hospital, Maiduguri. Materials and Methods: We conducted this descriptive and prospective study, using an adapted version of the Service Satisfaction Questionnaire (SSQ-30) to assess patient satisfaction with mental health care services at the Federal Neuropsychiatric Hospital, Maiduguri, Borno state, Nigeria. Consecutive, insightful and clinically stable follow-up outpatients of the hospital were recruited into the study that lasted one-week. We then subjected the data obtained to descriptive statistics using appropriate statistical packages the EPI-info (2002), to report averages. Results: The study found that respondents were generally satisfied with health services at the hospital, the overall general assessment of services was 83.8%. In addition, respondents were satisfied with the location and accessibility to psychiatric services (60.1%), and appearance and physical structure of the facilities (71.3%). However, we observed discrepancy between the overall assessment and other indices of patient satisfaction with services such as collaboration between service providers (48.8%), arrangement for after an hour emergency (50%) and waiting period before seeing the practitioner (51.3%). Conclusion: Despite the limitations of this study it suggests the need for more health systems research in Nigeria.