If Disney Ran Your Hospital: 9 1/2 Things You Would Do Differently

AORN Journal, April, 2005 by Mary Kay Harvey

If Disney Ran Your Hospital: 9 1/2 Things You Would Do Differently Fred Lee 2004, 203 pp $22 softcover

This book gives readers a new way to look at what it takes to achieve patient satisfaction. Using his experiences as a vice president for marketing at a Kansas hospital and as a senior vice president at Florida Hospital, a Disney facility, the author brings Disney culture to hospital management. Disney employees personify customer service. With courtesy, empathy, and imagination, this same level of commitment can be brought to health care settings.

In 10 chapters of engaging narrative, the author outlines his concepts and punctuates them with real-life anecdotes. He communicates a clear understanding of service industry satisfaction surveys and is well versed in the challenges faced by health care managers. In an effort to increase patient satisfaction scores, managers often adopt programs that are short sighted and superficial, according to the author. What he espouses is a shift in emphasis from caregiver service to patient experience.

The author defines patient satisfaction as the point at which basic expectations are met (ie, nothing bad happens during the hospital stay). Procedures are performed in a timely fashion, meals are palatable and served at the correct temperature, and nursing staff members are professional and efficient. This level of service is merely satisfactory--a three or four on most survey scales. What patients reward with high scores are memorable moments of compassion and care. Patients do not judge their hospital experience by how well their disease is treated but by how they are treated as people.

More important than satisfaction, however, is patient loyalty. How likely is the patient to use or recommend the hospital in the future? To increase loyalty in patients as well as staff members, hospital managers must create a culture of compassion and courtesy that supercedes the ordinary.

This book is a call to health care managers to rethink priorities and strategies related to patient satisfaction. I recommend it to health care managers at all levels.

This book is available from Second River Healthcare Press, PO Box 11202, Bozeman, MT 59719.

MARY KAY HARVEY

RN, CNOR

PATIENT CARE COORDINATOR

OCHSNER CLINIC FOUNDATION

NEW ORLEANS