Turkiye Klinikleri Journal of Health Sciences

.: REVIEW
'Hasta mı, Müşteri mi?' Tartışmasında Farklı Yaklaşımlar
Different Approaches on the Discussion of 'Patient or Customer?'
Seda AYDANa
aHacettepe Üniversitesi İktisadi ve İdari Bilimler Fakültesi, Sağlık Yönetimi Bölümü, Ankara, TÜRKİYE
Turkiye Klinikleri J Health Sci. 2020;5(2):375-83
doi: 10.5336/healthsci.2019-71966
Article Language: TR
Full Text
ÖZET
 Günümüzde bilgiye erişimin kolaylaşması, teknolojideki gelişmeler, eğitim düzeyinin ve sağlık okuryazarlığının artması gibi çeşitli nedenlerle sağlık hizmeti kullanıcılarının profili değişmiştir. Sağlık hizmeti kullanıcıları sağlık kurumlarından ve sağlık çalışanlarından daha fazla beklentiye sahip olup, kendileri ile ilgili kararlara daha aktif olarak katılmak istemektedirler. Kişilerin bu beklentilerini karşılayarak rekabet avantajı elde etmek isteyen sağlık kurumları ise sağlık hizmeti almak için gelen kişilere hasta yerine müşteri gibi davranabilmektedirler. Bazı kişilerce bu durumun sağlık hizmetinin sunumunda kaliteyi geliştireceği düşünülmekle birlikte, bazı kişiler ise sağlık hizmeti alan kişilere müşteri olarak yaklaşmanın, sağlık kurumlarının kendine has bazı özellikleri nedeni ile etik konular da dâhil olmak üzere, bazı sıkıntılara yol açabileceğini belirtmektedir. Bu çalışmada bu konudaki farklı bakış açıları ve yaklaşımlar ele alınarak tartışmak amaçlanmaktadır. Bu doğrultuda sağlık hizmeti kullanıcılarını ifade etmek için kullanılan çeşitli terimler, bu terimlerin kelime anlamları, sağlık hizmeti kullanıcılarının kendilerinin nasıl adlandırılmak istedikleri ve bu konudaki farklı görüşlere yönelik literatür derlemesi yapılmıştır. Yapılan incelemeler sonucunda, sağlık hizmetine ihtiyaç duyan kişilerin tümüne ihtiyaçları olan sağlık hizmetinin sunumunda onları dinleyen, onlarla ilgilenen, para kazanmaktan çok iyileştirmeyi amaçlayan, yanlış yönlendirmeyen tıbbi hizmetlerin sunulması açısından 'hasta' yaklaşımının, hastaların beklentilerini izleyen, tatmin düzeylerini ölçen pazarlama faaliyetleri ve onlara kaliteli bir hizmet sunma konusunda yapılacak iyileştirme faaliyetleri açısından ise 'müşteri' yaklaşımının benimsenmesi gerektiği sonucuna varılmıştır.

Anahtar Kelimeler: Hasta; müşteri; sağlık hizmeti kullanıcısı
ABSTRACT
 Today, the profile of health care users has changed due to various reasons such as easier access to information, developments in technology, and increased education and health literacy. Health care users have more expectations from health institutions and healthcare workers and they want to participate more actively in decisions about themselves. On the other hand, health institutions that want to gain competitive advantage by meeting these expectations of the people can treat the people who come to get health services as customers instead of patients. While some believe that this will improve the quality of health care provision, others say that approaching healthcare users as a customer may lead to some problems, including ethical issues, due to the specific characteristics of health care institutions. This study aims to discuss different perspectives and approaches on this subject. In this respect, literature review have been made about various terms used to express health service users, word meanings of these terms, how health service users want to be named and different opinions on this subject. As a result of the examinations, the 'patient' approach should be adopted in terms of providing non-misguided medical services to all the people in need of health care, listening to them in the provision of health care, taking care of them, aiming to cure them rather than making money; and 'customer' approach should be adopted in terms of marketing activities that follow the expectations of the patients and measure their level of satisfaciton, and measuring their level of satisfaction and improvement activities about providing them a quality service.

Keywords: Patient; customer; healthcare user
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