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Abstract
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Aims: Patient satisfaction is an important aspect of quality of care. Gaining insight into opinions about psychiatric services for children and adolescents is complicated by the fact that beside parents, it is essential to listen to the minor patients as well. Methods: 94 children, 87 adolescents, and 181 parents completed a questionnaire about satisfaction with services in eight Hungarian child psychiatric institutions. There were 64 (39%) males, the average age of children was 12 (1.3), for adolescents 15.7 (1.1) years. To assess patient satisfaction, we used the parent, adolescent, and child versions of a patient satisfaction questionnaire developed and validated in Hungary. The items were compared among the three groups. Results: 42.3% of the admissions were emergency cases, the rest were by appointment. Information about the psychiatric illness, treatment possibilities, rehabilitation, and rights/obligations of the patients were given to almost all parents (95.6%), to 83.3% of adolescents and 76.8% of children. Understanding the given information was problematic to 17.6% of parents, 36.8% of adolescents and 33.5% of children. 26.6% of the children and 45.6% of the adolescents still felt hungry after some of the meals. Time spent in hospital was boring for 21.36% of children and 26.4% of adolescents. 96.5% of parents would recommend the hospitals to others. Conclusions: Age-appropriate information about the illness, its treatment and prevention is equally important for the parents and the patients as well. Age-appropriate environment, nutritious and tasty food and adequately structured time during in-patient treatment contribute to the recovery of mental health problems.
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