Assessing patient needs for the enhancement of stroke rehabilitation services: A customer value perspective

Continuous participation in stroke rehabilitation programs enables function recovery and quality of life. However, research showed that stroke rehabilitation services do not necessarily meet the needs and the expectations of stroke patients. To address this issue, in this study, patient needs was assessed from the perspective of customer value. Customer value was defined using the service dimensions in SERVQUAL. Contextual Inquiry (CI) was conducted with three stroke patients and their therapists. Critical incidents (i.e., service gaps) were identified and categorized by the service dimensions. A follow-up survey was conducted with 11 stroke patients and 11 therapists to obtain subjective ratings on the critical incidents to provide quantitative insight that corroborated the findings from the CI in improving current stroke rehabilitation services. Results of the CI revealed that most occurred critical incident was related with reliability when therapists provided instructions on the rehabilitation activities. Results of the survey showed that (1) for stroke patients, all service dimensions were equally important; responsiveness was the least satisfied dimension; (2) Therapists believed that all service dimensions were addressed by their services; assurance was the most important dimension. The perceptual differences of the two groups on customer value led to recommendations on the current rehabilitation services. The outcomes of the study provided insight on critical stroke patient needs and contributed to the design of stroke rehabilitation therapy services.