I was struck by an op-ed piece I read recently in the New York Times. The author, Theresa Brown, RN, in her piece entitled Hospitals Aren't Hotels, opines that we set unrealistic goals in medical treatment when patient satisfaction scores are the primary measure of success. Is patient satisfaction always correlated with more expensive or aggressive treatment? Perhaps we need to redefine satisfaction? Can we shift our model of care from a "doing for" model to a "being with" model and still achieve patient satisfaction? Do we, as Theresa Brown suggests, always need to first hurt in order to heal?
Lots of food for thought here...would love to hear your comments!
Lots of food for thought here...would love to hear your comments!