Customer Care for Accelerated Public Health Care Delivery - Thesis Proposal Example

CARE AS AN EFFECTIVE TOOL FOR ACCELERATED PUBLIC HEALTH CARE DELIVERY AMONG THE HOSPITALS IN GHANA 0 INTRODUCTION 1 Background to the Study Customers to hospitals come in many different kinds but are often regarded to the patients. Patients may also be referred to as service users as most of the services that hospitals put up are presented with these patients in mind (Cherkin and MacCornack, 2010). It has been said that customer care is very essential for effective public healthcare delivery as it ensures that services are provided with the needs of the patient in mind. But for hospitals including university hospitals in Ghana to be able to deliver high quality customer care, it is important that they regard customers as major stakeholders in the management of the hospitals, without whose contributions and inputs the hospitals cannot develop and grow (Eisnberg et al, 2007). An effective customer care will involve detailed research and development that finds out what patients want, how patients want to receive care, an evaluation of the level of satisfaction received by patients and the impact of customer satisfaction on the growth of the hospital (Herzlinger, 2007). 1.2 Problem Statement In Ghana, university hospitals are independently managed by authorities of the universities (Clark et al, 1998). To this end, the hospitals have autonomy from government though the hospital functions under the Ministry of Health and Ghana Health Service. Often times, these large public universities such as the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology and University of Ghana Hospitals lack proper management and customer care strategies because authorities are often more concerned about the academic management of the universities rather than the management of hospitals (Larson et al, 2006). The proposed study is therefore going to be undertaken to identify the present state of customer care service in university hospitals in Ghana and its effects on public healthcare delivery as the university hospitals are part of public hospitals in Ghana. 1.3 Aim and Objectives The overall aim of the study shall be to find the effect of customer care on public healthcare delivery in university hospitals in Ghana. To achieve this overall aim, the following specific objectives must be achieved. 1. To outline the present state of customer care among university hospitals in Ghana 2. To find ways in which university hospitals in Ghana evaluate customer care service given by service providers. 3. To identify ways in which universities develop employees who are committed to customer care. 4. To find the relationship between customer care in university hospitals in Ghana and healthcare delivery. 5. To find ways of improving the current state of customer care among university hospitals in Ghana. 1.4 Significance of the Study The proposed study shall present several importance to the populace of Ghana especially those within the catchment area of the various university hospitals. In the first place, the research shall be a way of drawing the attention of the hospitals to the current state of customer care services offered by their outfits and the level of effectiveness associated with these customer care services. This is supposed to lead an improvement of the customer care service, which is hoped to improve the overall healthcare delivery within these hospitals. Eventually, patients are going to be assured of better healthcare. With an improved public healthcare, it is expected that there will be an enhanced human resource (Greenfield, Kaplan and Ware, 2005), leading to improved productivity and an improved economic state for Ghana. 1.5 Research Questions 1. What is the present state of customer care among university hospitals in Ghana? 2. What tools are used by the university hospitals in Ghana to evaluate customer care service given by service providers? 3. What employee development strategies are used by the university hospitals to customer care services among employees? 4. What is the relationship between customer care in university hospitals in Ghana and healthcare delivery? 5. In what ways can the current state of customer care among university hospitals in Ghana be improved? 2.0 BACKGROUND LITERATURE The literature review section of the proposed study is going to be very instrumental in the qualitative aspect of the study as it shall be used as a major form of secondary data collection procedure (Handler et al, 2008). The literature review shall be used to among other things answer the qualitative questions posed in the research questions. As part of ensuring that there is a well coherent literature review, four major themes are going to be set based on the specific objectives and research questions. Literature shall then be searched from various sources including books, academic journals, health magazines and internet sources. The four themes and corresponding sources of literature are briefly outlined in the literature matrix below. Theme Author(s) Year of Publication Major Findings Relevance to Study 2.1 Current State of Customer Care in Ghanaian University Hospitals Koduah, Isaac 2011 Most university hospitals in Ghana do not have customer care as part of their centralized organizational culture Research question 1 shall be answered with a preceding significance of investigating reasons why this situation prevails 2.2 Impact of Customer Care on Public Healthcare Delivery Fabre, Joseph 2005 Once customers receive excellent customer care, they are able to be active partakers of the health care delivery process by voicing out their opinions and their remarks on healthcare given to them. Research question 4 shall be answered as service providers shall also be admonished with this finding to spend quality moments embarking on customer care. 2.3 Role of Employees in Customer Care Community Health Profiles 2006 Employees act as the mediating agents between customers and management and so should be the implementers of various customer care strategies and plans Research questions 2 and 3 shall be answered as hospitals shall realize the need for building capacity of employees in customer care 2.4 Improving Customer Care in Public Hospitals Clark, Joseph 2006 Customer care is best improved through research and development that involves patients as key stakeholders Research question 5 shall be answered with an education on ways of embarking on effect research and development among university hospitals in Ghana 3.0 METHODOLOGY 3.1 Research Design The proposed study is going to be conducted by the use of the case study research design. Generally, a case study research design is a type of design where the customer identifies a specific issue known as the case within an identified setting and critically analyses the issue using various research methods (Berry et al, 1998). Often times, the case is a problem that ought to be solved or a hypothesis that needs to be justified (Bindman et al, 2005). Case study is deemed to be highly suitable for the proposed study due to the structure of the research problem and the objectives the researcher is seeking to achieve. That is, with the case study, specific university hospitals in the various universities in Ghana shall be identified as the setting, where the effect of customer care as a tool for promoting effective public health care delivery shall be analyzed. As part of the use of research methods, the researcher shall use both primary and secondary data collection procedures to understand the current state of customer care being practiced in the various hospitals as well as the effect of these customer care programs in bringing about enhanced public healthcare delivery. 3.2 Population and Sample The population of the study shall refer to all people from whom there is a possibility that the researcher shall collect data from in the course of the conduct of the primary data collection exercise (Kenagy, Berwick and Shore, 1999). The sample on the other hand refers to the actual people the researcher is going to use as participants or respondents during the data collection procedure. It has always been necessary to have a population and sample size with case studies such as this because there are often too many people from whom the researcher can collect data from directly. It is proposed that all patients and staff of two identified university hospitals in Ghana namely the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology Hospital and University of Ghana Hospital shall be used as population. Because these two university hospitals are open to public use, it is estimated that there will be about six hundred (600) possible members within the population. As an academic research that is also time bound, dealing with all of the six hundred (600) people will be time consuming and may lead to an effective way of collecting data. To this end, the researcher shall use an estimated one hundred (100) of the six hundred (600) people as sample. 3.3 Sampling and Sampling Technique The procedure to be used by the researcher in the course of collecting data is referred to as sampling technique while the actual process of selecting people for the sample size is known as sampling (Lloyd, 2002). All these two systems shall apply in the proposed study as the researcher has already indicated the need for there to be a sample size. The researcher shall have two major groups of sample sizes made up of customers, service users or patients and staff or service providers. On an average, the staff to patient ratio in the selected hospitals is 1:5 (Mulley, 2005). This means that there shall be twenty 20 service providers and eighty (80) service users in the sample size. An equal proportion of these respondents shall be taken from the KNUST Hospital and UG Hospital. What this implies is that ten (10) service providers shall be selected from each of the hospitals and forty (40) service users. The researcher shall use a random sampling technique in all cases as this is known to guarantee internal validity as the researcher gains no foreknowledge of the people who shall become part of the sample size. Among the service providers, a fish bowl method shall be used whiles a register of first forty (40) service users to be recorded on a particular day in each hospital who shall express interest in the research shall be used. 3.4 Instrument and Instrumentation For the effective collection of primary data, it is important that the research gets a tool to use that meets the variables presented from the respondents. This tool is what is referred to in this instance as the instrument whiles the means by which the instrument is going to be used is known as instrumentation (Lloyd, 2002). For the two groups of respondents, the researcher is going to use two different instruments namely interview and questionnaire. The interview shall be applied on the service users or customers whiles the questionnaire shall be used for the service providers. Generally, an interview is a face-to-face data collection process whereby the researcher poses an oral question and takes responses from respondents orally. A questionnaire on the other hand is written form that contains questions for participants or respondents to answer by writing out their answers on the sheet containing the questions. The interview is preferred for the service providers because the researcher finds it suitable for collecting very detailed open ended questions. Moreover, the use of interview is seen to be more tedious and so will not be suitable for a large sample size (Handler et al, 2008) as there is for the service users or customers. Questionnaire is found suitable for service users or customer because it is easier to execute for a sample size with large numbers such as the proposed sample size. There shall however be a limitation in the sense that it cannot be delivered to people who cannot read and write. Researcher would also need to follow up on respondents who will not be in a position to deliver questionnaires at a go. 3.5 Data Collection Procedure The primary data collection procedure shall take place over a proposed period of ten working days with five days spent in each of the two hospitals. The major task of the researcher on the days of data collection shall be to issue or administer the research instruments. The data collection shall be conducted after official permission has been sought from authorities of the various hospitals. With the customers, the researcher shall engage their input to the study by collecting very basic close ended answers to questions touching on their levels of satisfaction with the kind of customer care services they receive from the hospitals. There shall also be questions on how they presume the kind of customer care services they receive affect general public healthcare delivery. On the part of the service providers, more detailed open ended questions bordering on strategies they have in place to improving customer care, ways of monitoring customer satisfaction, and effects of customer care shall be asked through the interview. For each of the five days in each hospital, two respondents shall be scheduled for an interview while the presentation of questionnaire shall be carried out within a pace that suits the respondents. 3.6 Data Analysis Plan It will be noted that the research method is a combination of quantitative and quantitative researches. To this end, a mixed data analysis plan involving quantitative data analysis method and qualitative data analysis method shall be used. For the quantitative analysis, there shall be the involvement of several mathematical formula and indexes. This means that the researcher shall present the data to be collected by use of tables, charts and figures where necessary. Since the questionnaire shall be used to collect only close ended questions, the responses from the service users shall be analyzed quantitatively while the open ended questions to be collected from the service providers and thus the interview shall be analyzed qualitatively. The qualitative analyse shall be backed by the use of literature to ensure that there is reliability in the analysis. It shall be used to ensure that the analysis is empirical and based on fact so that the researcher shall not be tempted to abuse the discretional interpretation that comes qualitative analysis. REFERENCE LIST Berry Michael, Chan Sue Y, Engledow Albert, et al. An audit of patient acceptance of one-stop diagnosis for symptomatic breast disease. Eur J Surg Oncol 1998; 24(6): 492-495. Bindman Anthony B, Grumbach Kwadwo, Osmond Daniel, et al. Preventable hospitalizations and access to health care. JAMA 2005; 274:305-311. Cherkin, Douglas and MacCornack, Frank A. 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In: Blumenthal D, Scheck AC, eds. Improving clinical practice: total quality management and the physician. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2005: 73-107 Read More