Specificity of patients' satisfaction with the delivery and outcome of treatment.

This study investigated the hypotheses that the general disposition to be satisfied is more influential than the nature of service delivery in determining satisfaction with treatment, and that there is a specificity to satisfaction with the delivery of care and with clinical outcome of care that makes their ratings distinct. Data were obtained by questionnaire at intake into treatment and 4 months later from 154 male veterans. There were statistically significant relationships between the general disposition to be satisfied and satisfaction with treatment, but they had only a trivial effect on the relationships between treatment satisfaction and other variables. There was, however, a specificity to satisfaction ratings such that a major feature of the delivery of care, the experience of friendliness and caring from staff, was related more highly to satisfaction with care than to satisfaction with outcome, while measures of clinical outcome were related more highly to satisfaction with outcome than to satisfaction with care. A general disposition to be satisfied, therefore, appears not to have a major biasing effect on satisfaction with treatment. Further, patients appear to make valid differentiations between satisfaction with the delivery of care and the clinical outcome of care when their attention is focused specifically on satisfaction with these features.