Why are people dissatisfied with medical care services in Lithuania?
Department of Social Medicine, Kaunas University of Medicine, Lithuania. vbankauskaite@hotmail.comOBJECTIVES: To identify and describe the main sources of dissatisfaction with medical services among the population in Lithuania. DESIGN: Analysis of written responses to an open-ended question as a part of a questionnaire survey. PARTICIPANTS: A randomly selected group of 25–64-year-old men and women from the Utena and the Kaisiadorys regions of Lithuania. Of the 1395 survey respondents, 357 persons (25.6%) answered the question regarding the dissatisfaction with health care services. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Identification of the sources of dissatisfaction with medical care services among study participants. RESULTS: Twelve categories of dissatisfaction were identified that were related to three levels: shortcomings in the health care system (systemic level), deficiencies in provision and quality of services (institutional level) and deficiencies in physicians’ attitudes, skills and work
