La calidad en los servicios sociales de atención primaria desde la perspectiva de las personas usuarias

Abstract

The paper presents the users' perception on quality of the Primary Care Social Services of Spain (PCSS), as a part of the ongoing research project "Quality indicators in Social Services" (INCASS) (CSO2008-04359/SOCI), financed by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation (Plan Nacional I + D + i 2008-2011). Participation in its various forms has been and is considered a key characteristic of these services that also helps to improve its quality, but the experiences in this area in the PCSS are not numerous. This project introduces an innovative approach since it is taking into consideration the users' point of view as key information for the design of quality standards in social services. Following a qualitative approach with exploratory purposes, based in-depth interviews in three regions (Valencia, Murcia and Madrid) (N = 64, n = 61, 95.3% participation), the results obtained show that, from the users' point of view, the main content of the quality of the PCSS is the quality of professional care. They share a definition of quality, based on their subjective experience in the PCSS, developed from the characteristics of the professional counseling received, but also from the satisfaction of their demands. The study provides new, relevant and concrete information on the users' vision about what is quality in the PCSS and its implications for planning and evaluation of services.