The Impact of a Novel Use of Volunteers on Patient Satisfaction

A novel volunteer program was implemented in the adult emergency department waiting room to combat declining patient satisfaction, a crucial quality metric impacting everything from hospital reimbursement to clinical outcomes. Net Promotor Scores (NPS) were tracked in a retrospective cohort design, with patients interacting with volunteers serving as the intervention cohort and those who did not serving as control. Analysis using monthly NPS means was conducted from 2022 to 2023. The absolute difference in NPS between the 2 groups was 17.43. Using monthly means, an unpaired t -test was conducted. NPS in the intervention group was 51.86 with a standard deviation of 7.01. NPS in the control was 34.43 with a standard deviation of 5.32. Data is significant, with P = 0.0002. This emergency department waiting room volunteer program led to increases in patient satisfaction. Study authors think similar effects are achievable at other institutions, and future trials would be beneficial in confirming this suspected causal relationship.