ABSTRACT
This study investigates the effect of service quality on customer satisfaction in public and private hospitals in Benin City. The objectives of the study were to find out the impact of tangibility of service delivery on patient satisfaction, to investigate the influence of reliability of service delivery on patient satisfaction, to ascertain the effect of responsiveness of service delivery on patient satisfaction; to determine the impact of assurance of service delivery on patient satisfaction and to inspect the effect of empathy of service delivery on patient satisfaction in the Nigerian hospitals..
Respondents were selected from one (1) public and two (2) private hospitals in Benin City Metropolis, Edo State, Nigeria. The data were collected through personal administration of 110 questionnaires and had valid responses. The study also used frequency distribution, mean, standard deviation, t-test statistics analysis, multi regression analysis and tables as major statistical tools for data analysis and test of hypotheses.
The analysis revealed that assurance of the service delivery has significant relationship or influence on patient satisfaction in the Nigerian hospitals; tangibility of the service delivery has no significant influence on patient satisfaction, reliability of the service delivery has no significant relationship on patient satisfaction; responsiveness of the service delivery has no significant impact on patient satisfaction and that empathy of the service delivery has no significant impact on patient satisfaction in the Nigerian hospitals.
Finally, the study recommends that there is need for hospitals management to put into consideration the influence of assurance of the service delivery to patient satisfaction in the Nigerian hospitals. Also they should tailor their service delivery activities in a way that reflects on the patient satisfaction and there is need for the practitioners to invest massively on various service quality and develop more effective marketing campaign that attracts patient's attention and capture their interest.
