PRIORITIZATION OF QUALITY CARE CRITERIA TO DELIVER QUALITY SERVICE USING DEMATEL

Abstract

Purpose:-Hospitals are very vital as an element in Quality Care delivery and their evaluation in these terms on perpetual basis are much needed as these organizations contribute in improving health outcomes for general people. Hospitals, especially privately owned, are also run like businesses these days to remain competitive in the respective arena. The environment and situation faced by many hospitals are often complicated and which definitely requires insightful solutions to steer the direction of these businesses. This study was focused on the application of group decision-making tool, DEMATEL as one of the valid methods in Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM). Methodology:- The study was exploratory in nature and efforts were made to justify by highlighting the criteria prioritization procedure to be undertaken by any healthcare organization. A slight deviation from the standard four-steps of DEMATEL, a course of action was created in the shape of an eight-step procedure to exhibit a practical approach rather than mathematical theory approach. In order to make it more empirical in nature, a five-stage research framework was also devised and acted upon with the help of three separate questionnaires. Avedis Donabedian’s (1988) Quality Care framework was followed and multiple variables were devised, importance ratings were collected from patients on these devised variables and after reduction of variables in to manageable latent factors, called criteria in the study, DEMATEL method was applied to depict the prioritization of Quality Care criteria for the delivery of quality service via digraph. Findings:-The graphical representation through digraph showed that criteria were vertically divided in two halves as C1, C5, and C4 are shown as criteria influencing the lower half criteria C3, C6, and C2. The horizontal span of digraph reflected the importance of criteria prioritized and showed C1 criterion as the most important and C2 criterion with the least importance. Implications:-The prioritization of the criteria along with their cause and effect distribution gave an insight into the constitution framework of localized healthcare services of Karachi, Pakistan