Research Article
“If at Least the Patient Could Not Be
Forgotten About”: Communication in the
Emergency Department as a Predictor of
Patient Satisfaction
Journal of Patient Experience
2020, Vol. 7(6) 1015-1021
ª The Author(s) 2020
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DOI: 10.1177/2374373520957123
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Seiichi Villalona, MA1,2 , Carol Boxtha, BS3,
W Alex Webb, MSc2, Cirenio Cervantes, BS2, and
Jason W Wilson, MD, MA2,4,5
Abstract
Press Ganey survey data are used by institutions to understand patient experiences in the emergency department (ED). The
present mixed-methods retrospective cohort study examined the effects of hallway placement, pain management reporting,
communication approaches, time spent in the ED, and other demographic variables on predicting satisfaction ratings of
doctors, nurses, and overall ED care. A total of 4940 patient responses between January 1, 2012, and December 31, 2017,
were analyzed from 2 EDs associated with an academic institution and tertiary care center. Consensus coding was used to
qualitatively capture patient responses that relate to communication issues pertaining to care/empathy and understandings of
ED procedures. After controlling for multiple factors, hallway placement, pain management, and understanding of ED procedures were associated with higher odds of negative ratings for doctors, nurses, and overall assessment. Issues with patient
communication, particularly regarding understanding of ED procedures, were found to be a strong predictor of negative
ratings of doctors, nurses, and overall care. These findings point to the improvements in communication as a potential point of
intervention in mitigating negative patient experiences.
Keywords
patient satisfaction, communication, emergency department
Introduction
Patient experiences in the emergency department (ED) have
been a subject of interest for health care facilities due to its
influence on patient satisfaction. Additionally, the adoption
of the Triple Aim goal in health care has worked to improve
patient satisfaction and experience in receiving health services with reducing medical cost (1). This poses a considerable challenge for health care providers in both inpatient and
outpatient settings to improve patient outcomes, while maintaining the quality of the patient experience. Among different approaches, survey research has been widely used and
adapted to measure patient experiences in the form of satisfaction scores (2).
Studies demonstrate that patients want to be part of the
decision-making process (3) while also having their opinions
and values taken into consideration when receiving care (4).
This is further shown by associations previous studies have
identified as factors of negative satisfaction scores, which
include language barriers, with non-English speaking
patients being less satisfied and therefore less likely to do
follow-up care (5); needed communication support between
physicians and patients to help bridge uncertainties between
both parties to work toward a common goal (6); and hallway
1
2
3
4
5
Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, Piscataway, NJ, USA
Department of Anthropology, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL,
USA
Department of Health Outcomes & Behavior, Moffitt Cancer Center,
Tampa, FL, USA
Emergency Department, Tampa General Hospital, Tampa, FL, USA
Department of Internal Medicine, Division of Emergency Medicine,
Morsani College of Medicine at the University of South Florida, Tampa,
FL, USA
Corresponding Author:
Seiichi Villalona, Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, 675 Hoes
Lane West, Piscataway, NJ 08854, USA.
Email: svillalona@mail.usf.edu
Creative Commons Non Commercial CC BY-NC: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0
License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further
permission provided the original work is attributed as specified on the SAGE and Open Access pages (https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/open-access-at-sage).
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Journal of Patient Experience 7(6)
placement (7), all of which have been attributed with
patients having negative experiences. By examining these
and other unique parts of the patient experience, EDs can
attempt to remove or lessen their influence thus increasing
both satisfaction scores and overall patient care.
Despite studies making significant strides in discerning
the individual influences of these aforementioned variables,
a gap in literature currently exists in understanding how
multiple variables interact independently and relatively to
each other in predicting satisfaction scores. To the best of
our knowledge, there is no other current study that has
employed a multivariate analysis toward understanding
patient satisfaction in ED settings that has additionally considered communication as an important variable. In this retrospective study, we used data collected through Press
Ganey (PG) surveys to conduct a mixed-methods analysis
of patient satisfaction responses in order to better understand
specific factors that may influence the patient experience in
the ED.
Responses in the written comment section for all parts of
the survey allowed patients to freely provide open-ended
answers to discuss their personal experiences. These quotes
were qualitatively coded by the research team using a generalized inductive approach. After looking at each comment,
team members (SV, CB, and CC) coded whether patients
raised issues regarding: (1) mentions of pain management,
(2) hallway placement, or communication issues pertaining
to (3) caring and/or empathy, and (4) general understanding
of ED procedures (UEDP). The UEDP related to responses
by patients in reference to lack of clarity on different aspects
of their ED visits such as wait times for evaluation by hospital staff, reasons for why diagnostic tests were being performed, status of overall test results, and so on. Two team
members coded and reviewed each comment, followed by a
third team member reconciling coding discrepancies until a
consensus was reached (8). This method was used because of
its utility in reducing reviewer errors and biases by up to
21.7% (9).
Methods
Results
Descriptive Statistics
This study was approved by the institutional review board at
the University of South Florida and deemed as nonhuman
subjects research given that the survey results were retrospectively collected and contained deidentified information.
A mixed-methods approach was employed in analyzing the
patient satisfaction scores collected from 2 EDs associated
with an academic institution located in West Central Florida.
Satisfaction scores used in the analysis were collected
throughout a 6-year time period (January 1, 2012, to December 31, 2017). The PG surveys were distributed via a physical copy given after a patient’s ED visit. Patients had the
option of mailing the survey back to the respective hospital
through postal mail or completing an online version of the
survey.
Surveys consisted of satisfaction measures for 9 categories of patient experience. Responses were coded as being
negative, neutral, mixed, or positive. Neutral and mixed
responses were omitted from the final analyses due to the
ambiguity of interpretation between these types of
responses. The analyses undertaken in this study focused
exclusively on positive and negative rankings as binary
responses, for the survey sections pertaining to assessments
of nurses, doctors, and overall ED experience. Available
demographic and ED-specific variables included sex (male
and female), age, language (English and Spanish), time spent
in ED, first time in ED (first time and returning patient),
accompaniment (alone and with others), and mode of ED
arrival (self and ambulance). Approximately 9% to 15% of
responses within each subsection contained missing values
in relation to patient’s age and/or the time they spent in the
ED. Given the size of our data set, the research team took a
conservative approach and removed cases with missing values to better control for each variable’s potential effect.
A total of 4940 patients responded to the survey, which was
collected between January 1, 2012, and December 31, 2017.
Of those, 3239 (72%) met our criteria of having completed at
least one of the 3 sections of interest (pertaining to nurses,
doctors, and overall ED experience) and rating their experience as either positive or negative. On average, patients
filled out either 1 or 2 of the 3 sections with no 1 section
filled out by all participants.
The number of patient responses varied by survey section
with nurses (n ¼ 1603), doctors (n ¼ 1593), and overall
assessment (n ¼ 1529). A majority of participants were
English-speaking (97%), female (65.1%), and with a mean
age of 53 (standard deviation [SD] ¼ 16.4; Table 1). Of the
submitted responses, most came from patients placed in ED
rooms (91.6%), most did not mention pain management
(90.4%), as well as no communication issues pertaining to
caring/empathy from the ED staff (60.9%). Approximately,
half of the sample reported comments pertaining to understanding ED processes (51.1%). The median time spent in
the ED was 5 hours (SD ¼ 5.07).
Overall, patient responses to the 3 analyzed sections were
positive, with nurses having the highest positive response
percentage (69%), when compared to doctors (66%) and
overall assessment (61%). The negative ratings for nurses,
doctors, and overall care were 31%, 34%, and 39%, respectively. Table 1 provides a summary of the descriptive statistics of the study’s sample population.
Multivariate Logistic Regression
The multivariate binary logistic regression analysis performed on the patient responses for the nurses, doctors, and
overall assessment sections used rankings (positive or
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Villalona et al
Table 1. Descriptive Statistics of Study Sample.a
Frequency
Percent
Total
Male
Female
NA
English
Spanish
No
Yes
N/A
Arrived Alone
Accompanied
N/A
Ambulance
Other method
N/A
Room
Hallway
No mention
Pain mentioned
No mention
mentioned
1096
2111
32
3138
101
1287
1263
689
839
1721
679
445
2090
704
2969
270
2928
311
1654
1585
33.8
65.1
1.0
96.9
3.0
39.7
39.0
21.2
25.9
53.1
21.0
13.7
64.5
21.7
91.6
8.3
90.4
9.6
51.1
48.9
No mention
Mentioned
1972
1269
60.9
39.1
Variables
Sex
Language
First time in ED
Accompanied
Mode of transportation
Treatment location
Pain management
Understanding emergency
department procedures
(UEDP)
Caring/empathy reporting
Continuous variables
Age, years
Time spent in ED,
hours
M
SD
Min
Max
53.0
5.0
16.4
5.7
21
0
95
130
Abbreviations: ED, emergency department; M, male; Max, maximum; Min,
minimum; N/A, not available.
a
Occasionally, variables appeared in 1 section but not in another (eg, caring/
empathy issues during nurse encounter but not during doctor or overall).
“No mention” refers to patients who did not express those issues during
any portion of the survey.
negative) as the dependent variable. The independent variables consisted of age, sex, language, time spent in ED, first
time in ED, accompaniment, mode of transportation, treatment location, pain management mention, UEDP, and caring
reported. While controlling for the aforementioned variables, findings suggest trends and relationships between
variables and patient satisfaction scores.
Table 2 outlines the logistic regression model for patient
satisfaction of the overall ED experience. The 3 variables
associated with significantly higher odds of reporting negative satisfaction scores were pain management, UEDP,
and hallway placement. Mentions of pain management
were associated with approximately 7 times higher odds
of negative ratings of overall ED experience (adjusted odds
ratio [aOR] ¼ 7.43, 95 CI ¼ 3.56-15.48). Responses of
UEDP were associated with approximately 14 times higher
odds of negative ratings (aOR ¼ 13.9, 95 CI ¼ 10.5018.40). Hallway placement was associated with about 5
times higher odds of negative ratings of overall ED experience (aOR ¼ 4.89, 95 CI ¼ 2.96-8.05). Perceptions of
caring/empathy were significantly had an inverse relationship with negative patient satisfaction scores (aOR ¼ 0.25,
95 CI ¼ 0.18-0.36). Thus, the odds of patients who noted
caring/empathy in their responses reporting a negative
experience were slightly lower those who did not mention
caring. However, in comparison to other variables, the
effect of caring/empathy on negative satisfaction scores is
nominal.
Responses pertaining to ratings of nurses (Table 2)
appeared to have a similar pattern of findings to those of
overall ED experience. Responses that included mentions
of pain management were associated with about 5 times
higher odds of negative ratings (aOR ¼ 5.60, 95 CI ¼
2.79-11.20). The UEDP and hallway placement were associated with 18 (aOR ¼ 17.80, 95 CI ¼ 13.1-24.10) and 7
(aOR ¼ 7.14, 95 CI ¼ 4.35-11.70) times higher odds of
negative ratings of nurses, respectively. Similar to overall
experience scores, caring/empathy concerns had an inverse
predictive association with negative patient satisfaction ratings (aOR ¼ 0.32, 95 CI ¼ 0.24-0.44).
Satisfaction ratings of doctors (Table 2) followed a similar pattern to that of overall ED experience and nurses.
Pain management was associated with 5 times higher odds
of negative satisfaction ratings of doctors (aOR: 5.67,
95 CI ¼ 3.49-9.21). The UEDP was associated with 11
times higher odds of negative doctor ratings (aOR: 11.50,
95 CI ¼ 8.74-15.12). Hallway placement was associated
with 3 times higher odds of negative ratings (aOR: 3.08,
95 CI ¼ 1.94-4.89). Consistent with the other 2 reporting
sections, caring/empathy had an inverse predictive relationship with negative patient satisfaction ratings (aOR ¼ 0.42,
95 CI ¼ 0.32-0.56).
Qualitative Responses
In total, the written survey responses given by patients were
2267 for overall assessment, 2084 for nurses, and 2160 for
doctors. Specific qualitative patient responses (Table 3) were
identified as a way of adding descriptive context to the significant findings from our multivariate analyses. These
quotes highlight the emotions and areas of concerns from
the patient perspective.
Discussion
Multivariate logistic regression modeling of overall assessment, nurses, and doctors suggested significant associations
between pain management, UEDP, and hallway placement
with negative patient satisfaction scores. In all 3 regression
models, UEDP was the single most influential driver of negative patient ratings.
Pain Management Issues
The illustrative quotes of patients discussing pain management appear to point to sentiments of ED staff disregarding
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Journal of Patient Experience 7(6)
Table 2. Logistic Regression Models.
Assessment of overall ED
experience
95% CI
aOR (Lower-upper)
Pain management mentioned
Understanding emergency department
procedures (UEDP) mentioned
Hallway placement
Care/empathy reporting
N/A accompanied
Accompanied self
Accompanied with other
N/A first time
Been to ED before
First time to ED
N/A sex
Male
Female
Spanish speaking
Age, years
N/A mode of transportation
Arrive in ambulance
Arrive by other method
Time spent in ED, hours
7.43
13.9
(3.56-15.5)
(10.5-18.4)
4.89
0.25
(2.96-8.05)
(0.18-0.36)
1.09
1.28
(0.40-2.96)
(0.48-3.42)
1
1.1
(0.41-2.44)
(0.45-2.67)
1.43
0.97
0.8
0.98
(0.35-5.87)
(0.74-1.26)
(0.37-1.75)
(0.98-0.99)
1.42
1.05
1
(0.60-3.37)
(0.47-2.37)
(1.00-1.00)
Sig.
Assessment
of nurses
95% CI
aOR (Lower-upper)
<0.01 5.6
<0.01 17.8
<0.01
<0.01
0.57
0.86
0.62
0.83
1
0.84
0.84
0.62
0.8
0.58
<0.01
0.3
0.43
0.9
0.23
(2.79-11.2)
(13.1-24.1)
7.14
0.32
(4.35-11.7)
(0.24-0.44)
1.71
1.99
(0.60-4.88)
(0.70-5.64)
1.15
1.15
(0.43-3.10)
(0.43-3.08)
2.68
1.15
1.08
0.99
(0.62-11.6)
(0.85-1.57)
(0.44-2.63)
(0.98-0.99)
1.03
0.54
1
(0.38-2.79)
(0.21-1.41)
(1.00-1.00)
Assessment
of doctors
Sig
95% CI
aOR (Lower-upper)
Sig
<0.01 5.67
<0.01 11.5
(3.49-9.21)
(8.74-15.1)
<0.01
<0.01
<0.01
<0.01
0.34
0.32
0.2
0.96
0.78
0.78
0.32
0.19
0.36
0.87
<0.01
0.01
0.95
0.21
0.19
3.08
0.42
(1.94-4.89)
(0.32-0.56)
1.86
1.8
(0.68-5.05)
(0.67-4.84)
1.19
1.41
(0.47-3.06)
(0.55-3.58)
1.76
1.12
1.05
0.98
(0.31-9.96)
(0.85-1.49)
(0.47-2.35)
(0.97-0.99)
0.57
0.49
1
(0.20-1.57)
(0.19-1.30)
(1.00-1.00)
<0.01
<0.01
0.48
0.22
0.25
0.45
0.72
0.47
0.62
0.52
0.42
0.92
<0.01
0.3
0.27
0.15
0.38
Abbreviations: aOR, adjusted odds ratio; ED, emergency department; N/A, not available; Sig, significance.
their pain. This could be due to a multitude of reasons. One
study focusing on patient demographics (10) and patient/
physician interactions concluded that both of these factors
influence patient satisfaction in regard to pain management.
The study showed the perceived notion that patients feel
as though physicians do not care of their pain as well as
physicians assuming that patients exaggerated their
reported pain. The focus on demographics was further
looked at in another study finding that older ED patients
were administered pain medication less than their younger
counterparts (11).
In efforts to resolve these issues, EDs can focus on educating their staff on these biases and how they impact the
patient’s perception not only of the ED but on the actual care
received by the patient (12-13). Some of these biases may
even be unknown to physicians at times. This could be done
using a longitudinal approach which assesses the EDs staff
perception of pain requesting before and after the educational intervention, while also assessing patient’s perceptions of pain relief.
Hallway Placement
Among the responses that pertained to hallway placement,
many included quotes related to issues about being forgotten
or ignored by ED staff, delayed time for patients to be seen,
and lack of privacy, among others. The association between
hallway placement and negative patient satisfaction ratings
is not something new and has been noted in previous studies
(14-15). Recommendations include adjustments to boarding
location, with one study showing patient boarding preference to be the ED inpatient ward (16). Others include
emphasis of caring and empathetic communication styles
with patients to ensure that patients to not feel forgotten or
as if their issues do not matter (17).
All emotions emphasized by patient responses demonstrate frustrations, which contribute an additional stressor
on top of the physical pain experienced. To address this, EDs
should consider understanding emotional distress patients
experience, as well as find effect ways to convey emotional
support (18).
Understanding Process Issues
The impacts of UEDP can also be seen by the qualitative
examples. Responses pertaining to overall assessment
included patient comments toward confusion of why there
were long wait times, team member roles, validation of
patient concerns by ED staff, and duration time of the patient
seen by the physician, among others. Recommendations
include continuous communication between ED staff members and patients, including their family through the time of
the visit. Simple tasks, such as staff introducing themselves
and being clear when discussing why they are approaching a
patient, can create a trusting environment and serve as means
to build a positive relationship with the patient throughout
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Villalona et al
Table 3. Illustrative Quotes From Open-Ended Patient Responses.
Issue mentioned
UEDP
“I felt like the nurse I had did not feel as though my injury was serious, and generally acted
like it was a bother to them that I was even there. They mentioned a couple of times
how busy they were with “real traumas.” When I questioned about what physician
told us regarding some test; after waiting 2 hours for the tests, the nurse became a
little condescending & argumentative, with both of us.”
Communication, hallway placement, UEDP
“I am a clinician myself - so I understand the importance of having empathy for my
patient, I know the ED is a busy place and various team members see one patient—if at
least the patient could not be forgotten about or made to feel as if they were forgotten
about. This happened to me many times that day.”
Communication, hallway Placement, UEDP
“I just put the responsibility on the hospital administrators for not having enough
doctors to be able to take care of the demands without so much delay.”
Communication, hallway placement, UEDP
“I had been to the ER the week before this visit, and because we waited 4 1/2 hours
before getting into the ER and then an additional 3 hours lying on a bed in the hallway,
I’m not sure I’d recommend the ED without reservations due to the long wait time.”
Pain management, communication, UEDP, caring/ “If triage nurse took me seriously and listened, I would have avoided pain, discomfort &
empathy
possibly blood lost.”
Hallway placement
“Nurses told me they were very busy treating patients who needed it more. Showed me
to a bed in the hallway that my daughter had to help me get onto - maybe they could
observe me from wherever they were at but they did not come to check on me very
often—felt like they were not paying attention.”
Communication, UEDP, caring/empathy
“Doctor took short cuts in treatment never look in eyes, mouth, throat check legs or
even check my heart rhythm.”
Pain management, communication, caring/
“I felt as if I was just a nuisance and that they had more important issues. I was in real pain
empathy
with a fever and no one seemed to care. Oh yes, the doctor said he was going to
confer with his compatriot about the figures my daughter pointed out. He never
returned!”
Communication, hallway placement
“He stated I’ve seen this a million times wrote my prescriptions and sent me home.”
Hallway placement, UEDP, caring/empathy
“They were both very nice and both took the time to listen and speak to me to really get
to the bottom of my problem.”
Pain management
“Both doctors I saw barely spent 2 minutes in the room. They did not express any
concern for the amount of pain I was in and looked at me as if I wasn’t a person. They
also kept asking questions that they should have had access to being that I came there
by ambulance from an urgent care center.
Pain management, communication, hallway
“After waiting to be seen for 5-6 hours or more, in pain, the nurse was very rude because
placement, UEDP, caring/empathy
I told her the muscle relaxer pill she was giving me would not touch my pain, from
many similar visits for the same pain syndrome. I have a lot of experience with this! She
then snapped at me . . . do you want to be treated or not?! She was very short with me
and wanted nothing to do with treating me! Triage: I was the only patient in the waiting
room writhing in pain for > 5 hours. Everyone else was sleeping while they waited. I
was in the hallway.”
Pain management, communication, UEDP
“As I had been in the ER in November 2016 for back pain, everyone seemed to assume it
was the same condition. It was not. The pain was on my lower right side wrapping
around towards my belly (thus the concern for appendicitis).”
Abbreviations: ED, emergency department; ER, emergency room; UEDP, understanding of ED procedure.
their ED stay (19). With one study that noticed significant
differences in increased satisfaction scores when physicians
smiled, made eye contact, and acknowledged long wait
times (20), this could be facilitated using navigators (21)
who explain processes as staff continuously checkup on
patients and families. Other work regarding physician–patient
communication has demonstrated high overall satisfaction
among patients who reported their physician actively listening
and considering their input toward their care (22). Patients can
be allowed to take an active role in their care planning through
being given information on the risks and benefits of each
treatment option in ways that avoid misunderstandings and
help mitigate feelings of being ignored or that their issues are
not being addressed (23).
As seen, most patient comments include multiple factors
that lead to negative satisfaction ratings. Although previous
recommendations could all serve as mitigators for patient
issues, our analysis revealed UEDP to be the most influential
indicator of negative ratings of nurses, physicians, and overall assessment. This finding points to the importance of communication regarding patient care throughout the ED
encounter and follow-up care after discharge.
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Journal of Patient Experience 7(6)
Limitations
References
This multivariate analysis of PG survey responses is useful
to better understand how patients experience receiving ED
care, but further research is needed. While this study incorporated numerous response domains (nurses, doctors, overall
experience) to assess the reliability of variables to response
outcomes, retrospective approaches may exhibit recall or
misclassification biases. Future studies would benefit from
adopting a time-series design of patient treatment experiences in the ED.
Additionally, future research would benefit from controlling for other potentially confounding variables. For
instance, the location of the EDs discussed in this analysis
includes a population that is of a diverse community with
29.3% of the population identifying as Hispanic or Latino
and 17.8% identifying as Black or African American. The
current collection of data came from predominantly
English-speaking women, showing an over-representation
of a certain group of individuals. Including racial or ethnic
demographic data for survey responses can help researchers
better understand what different patient populations find
most important and influential toward their experience in
ED settings.
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Conclusion
The findings from this retrospective mixed-methods study
suggest pain management, UEDP, and hallway placement as
key drivers of higher odds of negative patient experiences
while receiving care in the ED. Multivariate logistic regression modeling indicated UEDP as a strong predictor of negative satisfaction ratings of nurses, doctors, and overall
assessment. These findings point to a variety of interventions
which can be used to tackle the issues commented by
patients which include ED staff education, adjustment for
boarding patients, and frequent communication with patients
throughout the course of their ED visit. Continued research
is needed with a prospective approach and multivariable
analyses, while also focusing on collecting surveys from a
diverse group of patients.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect
to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
ORCID iD
Seiichi Villalona, MA
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2442-576X
Supplemental Material
Supplemental material for this article is available online.
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Author Biographies
Seiichi Villalona is a third year medical student at Rutgers Robert
Wood Johnson Medical School.
Carol Boxtha is a research coordinator at Moffitt Cancer Center.
W Alex Webb is a doctoral candidate in applied anthropology at
the University of South Florida.
Cirenio Cervantes was a medical anthropology research assistant
at the University of South Florida.
Jason W Wilson is an associate professor of emergency medicine
at the Morsani College of Medicine at the University of South
Florida.