Chinese Medical Doctors' Satisfaction of Global Budgeting System

In July 2000, the Bureau of National Health Insurance had implemented global budgeting system (GBS) on traditional Chinese medical outpatient services. It is of the essence in investigating caregivers' satisfaction of GBS. The purpose of this study was to examine Chinese Medical Doctors' (CMDs) satisfaction level of GBS. This study was a cross-sectional questionnaire survey. The universe of this study was NHI-contracted CMDs in Taiwan. Fifteen hundred subjects were selected as study samples, using a stratified systematic sampling technique; of which, 670 subjects responded to the survey, for a response rate of 44.7%. The results revealed that CMDs' satisfaction levels ranked from medium to low, of which, the indices of professional autonomy and process of peer-review auditing ranked the lowest. The CMDs affiliated with Central Precinct tended to be less satisfied in all indices than their counterparts of other precincts. In addition, the findings indicated that CMDs with bachelor degree, formal Chinese medical training, and/or fewer experience in practice tended to be less satisfied than their counterparts, in terms of professional autonomy and process of peer-review auditing. The results also revealed that the greater the number of patients seen, the lower the satisfaction of professional autonomy and process of peer-review auditing. This study offered precious insights of GBS evaluation from caregivers' perspective, and the findings can be used as baseline references for studies on CMDs' satisfaction of GBS in the future.