An index of consumer satisfaction with mental health services: Instrument development and testing.

Abstract

Satisfaction with mental health services has long been considered an important measure of treatment effectiveness. It, has, however, received limited attention from researchers, especially in recent years. The purpose of this study was to develop and test a measure of satisfaction with the partial hospitalization programs offered by Psychiatric Management Resources. The assumption behind the design of the instrument is that satisfaction is defined not only by the extent to which the provision of a service met consumers' expectations, but also how important the service was from the perspective of the consumer. The Consumer Satisfaction Questionnaire, 8 item version, (CSQ-8) was included as a measure of convergent validity. The CSQ-8 and other instruments had thus far succeeded in measuring general satisfaction. The Index of Consumer Satisfaction with Mental Health Services (ICS/MHS), used in this study, was able to reliably index satisfaction with 13 aspects of treatment that consumers felt were important. Scores on the ICS/MHS were highly correlated with the CSQ-8. This instrument, although more labor intensive than the CSQ-8, is able to provide information that can be used to design and modify treatment programs so that they are better able to meet the needs of consumers.