User satisfaction of the health services: A methodological quality checklist

Abstract

Objective Describe the methodological characteristics of observational studies in the field of evaluation of user satisfaction of PHC services at the regional level by applying a new checklist generated by the authors. Methods A cross-sectional descriptive study, carried out between April and August 2017, included 17 publications on satisfaction in Primary Health Care published in Latin American journals. Results In the classification according to the proposed checklist, both reviewers agreed on items such as: no inclusion of ethical aspects (10/17; 58,8%), no declaration of population/universe (6/17; 35,3%); does not comply with the initially declared objective (5/17; 29,4%), does not declare period of study completion (4/17; 25,3%) publications, does not declare study type (3/17; 17,6%). Value of the Spearman RHO correlation of qualified items between both reviewers (r=0,653). Conclusions The methodological approaches of the characterized publications are descriptive, cross-sectional with the absence of important items or methodological characteristics in almost all cases, which makes methodological reproducibility difficult; with few publications whose findings are reproducible. The proposed list proved to be a practical tool for methodological verification of observational studies on user satisfaction of health services in Primary Health Care.