PHYSICIAN SATISFACTION WITH PRIMARY-CARE OFFICE VISITS

To study encounter-specific physician satisfaction we collected exit q uestionnaires from patients and physicians following 550 primary care office visits. The physicians' questionnaire included 20 items pertain ing to satisfaction with the visit, one of which was an assessment of global satisfaction. Using a bootstrap technique, we factor analyzed t he satisfaction questions in 10 repeated samples. Four distinct dimens ions of physician satisfaction emerged: satisfaction with the patient- physician relationship, with the data collection process, with the app ropriateness of the use of time, and with the absence of excessive dem ands on the part of the patient. Each scale was found to be reliable; global satisfaction was most closely related to the relationship facto r. Satisfaction with use of time and the adequacy of data collection t ended to be stable for individual physicians across a range of patient s whereas global satisfaction and satisfaction with the relationship a nd the demanding nature of the patient and were more variable, hence m ost unique to each encounter. This study of physician satisfaction rep resents an effort to incorporate knowledge about physicians' subjectiv e experiences into a systematic understanding of the dynamics of the m edical interview.