Patient's satisfaction with orthodontic care from an academic clinical service.

Background and objectives: To investigate patients' satisfaction with the services provided by the orthodontic clinic at the Faculty of Dentistry, University of Otago, and to test the efficacy of corrective actions tailored on the basis of patients' feedback. Methods: The study was designed as longitudinal study, which included two surveys and a corrective action. During the first survey, a questionnaire on patient's satisfaction was distributed to 59 patients and 43 parents attending the Orthodontic Clinic at the University of Otago School of Dentistry. On the basis of the survey results, a number of corrective actions where then implemented for four months. A second survey was then organized and the questionnaires were distributed again to an independent sample of 48 patients and 52 parents. The efficacy of the corrective actions was analysed by comparing the results of the two surveys. Results: The satisfied areas by patients and parents included the way that clinicians communicated with them and how their emergencies were dealt with, the ease of making, cancelling and rescheduling appointments, treatment cost and the cleanliness of the clinic. Three areas of lower satisfaction were identified, including the magazines in the waiting area, sending a reminder prior to appointments, and giving an explanation if the appointment is delayed. The corrective actions were thus developed targeting on those three areas, and significantly improved the satisfaction about the magazines and explaining the reason of the delay (all p < 0.05). The improvement for the reminders was not significant. Conclusion: Patients and parents were generally satisfied with the services provided by the Orthodontic Clinic of the University of Otago Dental School. The correction actions based on participants' feedback improved the quality of service. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]