The Polish version of the Treatment Satisfaction with Medicines Questionnaire (SATMED-Q)

Type of funding sources: None.

Treatment satisfaction seems to be related to patient adherence and is a quality indicator that can be used to improve healthcare and that influences patient preferences. Information about treatment satisfaction can contribute to predicting treatment adherence and help decision-making by clinicians. Therefore, measuring this parameter is one of the health outcomes that must be observed in daily clinical practice. Unfortunately, there are still few publications assessing the treatment satisfaction, and there are no Polish versions of tools to facilitate standard, regular evaluation of the process.

The aim of the study was to develop a Polish version of the Treatment Satisfaction with Medicines Questionnaire (SATMED-Q) to assess the patient satisfaction with the treatment received.

This study included 197 patients (64.73±13.27 years) with hypertension (n=55), type 2 diabetes (n=42) and heart failure (n=100). The Polish version of the SATMED-Q was used in the study. Scores on each subscale of SATMED-Q and the total score are expressed on a 0-100 scale, where a higher score indicates greater satisfaction. Socio-clinical data were obtained from medical records of patients.

Cronbach’s alpha for the total score of SATMED-Q is 0.847 and does not require the exclusion of any items to increase its value. Cronbach's alpha for individual domains was: undesirable side effects - 0.985, treatment effectiveness – 0.864, convenience of use - 0.917, impact on daily activities - 0.886, medical care – 0.899, global satisfaction – 0.885. The loadings of the individual items ranged from 0.76 do 0.986. A satisfactory values of the fit indices RMSEA (<0.001), CFI (>0.999), TLI (>0.999) and SRMR (0.067) were obtained. Patients obtained the highest scores in the domain of undesirable side effects (85.32±28.62) and the lowest in the domains of satisfaction with medical care (61.61±28.36) and impact of treatment on daily activities (66.54±26.90). The correlation analysis showed that the SATMED-Q total score and subscale scores of convenience of use (81.06±25.18 vs. 73.33±17.85; p=0.003) and impact on daily activities (72.27±30.26 vs. 62.17±25.14; p=0.011) were significantly higher in the hypertension group than in the heart failure group. In the domain undesirable side effects the mean score was significantly higher in the heart failure group than in the diabetes group (90.33±25.12 vs. 74.6±33.08; p=0.008) and the treatment effectiveness subscale score was significantly higher in the hypertension and diabetes groups than in the heart failure group (74.8±28.0 vs. 63.08±20.56; p=0.002).

The SATMED-Q is a very good tool for assessing patient’s satisfaction with the treatment in Polish-speaking settings and can be recommended for use in everyday practice.