Disease Severity and Treatment Does Not Affect Satisfaction in Diverticulitis.

Background: Patient satisfaction is widely reported and impacts satisfaction despite a limited understanding of the clinical and structural determinants. Patients with diverticulitis are admitted to various services, with variable disease severities. They, therefore, represent a unique group to delineate relationships between these factors and satisfaction. We examined the factors that impact hospital satisfaction in patients with diverticulitis.Materials and methods: Patients admitted between 2009 and 2012 were identified using International Classification of Diseases 9th Revision (ICD-9) codes. The primary outcome of patient satisfaction was the Press Ganey Survey overall hospitalization satisfaction question because of a high response rate. This is a precursor survey to the widely available Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Systems and Providers Survey. There was high concordance between these items. Clinical and structural variables were collected retrospectively. Patients were divided into two groups based on whether they gave the topbox response for the overall hospital rating.Results: Sixty-six patients were identified (56% female, 63 +/- 14 years, length of stay: 5 +/- 5 d). Seventy-four percent patients rated the hospitalization as topbox. Forty-four percent were admitted to a surgical service, and 21% of all patients underwent an operation. When comparing the topbox to the nontopbox group, demographics and disease severity were similar. Treatment modality, admitting service, and outpatient intravenous antibiotics did not influence patient satisfaction.Conclusions: Clinical and structural variables did not impact overall hospital satisfaction for patients admitted with diverticulitis. This indicates that less-tangible aspects of in-hospital care may be the primary determinants of hospital satisfaction in this group. Efforts aimed at defining these variables are needed to improve patient satisfaction. (C) 2017 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.