Comparing the levels of hospital’s social accountability: Based on ownership

Background and objective: Social accountability is an effective strategy for improving the quality and performance of health-care service providers. This research aimed to compare the social accountability levels of hospitals based on the kind of their ownership. Material and methods: This applied research was conducted in 2016. Research population included hospitalized patients in different selected hospitals located in Golestan province, Iran. 361 patients were selected as the study sample by applying Kochran's sample size formula in 95 confidence interval. The Persian version of a standardized questionnaire made by World Health Organization was used for measuring the social accountability. Data were analyzed in SPSS. Findings: The total mean rate of social accountability in the private hospital was the highest (135.55 ± 15.55). There was a significant difference in social accountability rate among studied hospitals based on the kind of their ownership (p <.001). Taking the kind of ownership into account, there was a significant difference among the hospitals in the all components of the social accountability in favor of the private hospital (p <.05). Conclusion: The social accountability has better status in the private hospital than that of social security and teaching ones. © 2017, © 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group