The Effect of Service Quality on Patients Satisfaction in Private Hospitals of the Guilan and Ranking these Hospitals Using Fuzzy Analytical Hierarchy Process Technique

Growing the number of private institutions offering health care and fierce competitive market conditions in the private hospitals industry cause to pressure these hospitals to provide high-quality services. The purpose of this study was to examine the effect of service quality on patient satisfaction in private hospitals of the Guilan province.
Based on standard model of Büyüközkan et al (2011) a new dimension professionalism to SERVQUAL model was added that has used six dimensions including tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, assurance, empathy and professionalism as the dimensions of service quality. The number of samples was 360 patients hospitalized in four private hospitals and a standard questionnaire was used to assess the quality of services. Pearson Correlation Coefficient and Simple and Multiple Linear Regression was used to analyze the data and then by using ANOVA and Duncan’s and by Fuzzy Analytical Hierarchy Process technique, ranking of private hospitals was performed.
Four dimensions: tangibles, responsiveness, empathy and professionalism on patient satisfaction have been found to be effective while Components of trust and assurance in private hospitals of the Guilan province had no significance effect.
Based on the effects of service quality dimensions except trust and assurance recommend that hospitals can increase patient satisfaction if they pay special attention to patient in empathy, updating facilities and technology in tangibles, fast response to patient in responsiveness, employing professional and skilled human resources in professionalism dimensions.