Patient satisfaction data generally come from survey data. Several private organizations, such as NRC+Picker, Press Ganey, and the health care division of Gallup, provide extensive consulting services to health care organizations across the country. One of these services is to conduct patient satisfaction surveys. Some health care organizations undertake patient satisfaction surveys on their own. The advantage of using a national organization is the comparative database it offers, which organizations can use for benchmarking purposes.
Some of the most widely used groups of patient experience surveys in the public arena were developed under the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS) program. CAHPS originated in 1995 to assess participants’ perspectives on their health plans. Since that time the program has evolved to include the following surveys:
• Health Plan
• Clinician & Group
• Hospital
• Home Health Care
• In-Center Hemodialysis
• Nursing Home
• Surgical Care
• American Indian
• Dental Plan
• Experience of Care and Health Outcomes (for mental health and substance abuse services)