Measuring healthcare quality in Southern Ecuador prisons: a focus on health performance indicators

Abstract

Introduction: Access to adequate and timely health care is one of the greatest challenges faced by the prison population, hindered by factors such as: overcrowding, lack of medical supplies and also the absence of adequate infrastructure. The aim of this research is to measure the quality performance indicators of the existing health services in a prison rehabilitation centre in the south of the country, according prisoners perspective. Methodology: the study was an observational, analytical, cross-sectional, non-randomised, analytical study. and involved a sample of 257 inmates. The instrument used was the SERVQUAL questionnaire, which measures the quality performance of health services. The analysis was bivariate and statistics such as chi-square and Student's t-test were used. The software used was SPSS version 26. Results: This study analyzed a sample of 257 men deprived of their liberty, whose average age was 38 years. The level of satisfaction with the services is relatively low with regard to the quality of care, at 42.41%. Moreover, the perception of dissatisfaction was associated with younger people and with a high level of education. Conclusions: Satisfaction with health care at the prison level is low and is related to age and educational level; furthermore, it is important to emphasise that in most of the dimensions of the SERVQUAL scale, the lowest performing factors were those related to the care provided by health staff.