RESEARCH ARTICLE Client priorities and satisfaction with community pharmacies: the situation in Tehran Gholamhossein Mehralian • Maryam Rangchian • Hamid Reza Rasekh Received: 19 August 2013 / Accepted: 21 February 2014 / Published online: 22 July 2014 Ó Koninklijke Nederlandse Maatschappij ter bevordering der Pharmacie 2014 Abstract Background Client satisfaction is an important criterion to evaluate pharmacy services. In addition, knowledge about client satisfaction can be helpful to identify strengths and weaknesses which can be used to improve health services. Objective The aim of this study was to assess clients’ priorities and satisfaction with community pharmacy services in Tehran. Setting This study was conducted on clients visiting community phar- macies settled in Tehran, the capital city of Iran. Method A cross-sectional descriptive study involving clients of community pharmacies was undertaken using a self- administrated anonymous questionnaire. Data were col- lected from 800 clients of 200 community pharmacies settled in 22 districts of Tehran. Main outcomes measure Clients’ satisfaction with four areas including community pharmacies physical space, relationship quality, consulta- tion quality and other dimensions of service delivery, and clients’ priorities about different issues related to commu- nity pharmacies. Results The study showed that client satisfaction regarding the four mentioned areas (relation- ship quality, physical space, consultation quality and other dimensions of service delivery) was more than the average of Likert scale (cut point = 3). However, satisfaction with consultations is not much higher than the mentioned cut point. Moreover, ‘‘observing courtesy and respect’’ and ‘‘computerized dispensing’’ showed the most and the least priority to respondents, respectively. Conclusion Accord- ing to the findings, it seems that a wide range of corrective actions can be performed to promote the level of client satisfaction especially in case of consultations. More importantly, clients’ needs and priorities should be taken into account to select and prioritize these actions. Keywords Community pharmacy Á Client priorities Á Client satisfaction Á Iran Impact of findings on practice • Community pharmacists in Tehran, Iran, should give more attention to counselling, especially about herbal medicines and complementary products, and about health services. • Pharmacists in Tehran are considered to be courteous and reliable by their clients. Introduction The aim of an efficient health system is to provide good quality public health services. Nowadays, client (client defined as either the patient of their carer) satisfaction is considered as a major determinant factor of quality, to the extent that in the United States, the reimbursement of phy- sicians’ services is linked to this factor [1]. Moreover, public dissatisfaction with services leads to poor morale amongst staff which ultimately leads to lower standards of service Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s11096-014-9928-7) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. G. Mehralian (&) Á M. Rangchian Á H. R. Rasekh Department of Pharmacoeconomics and Pharma Management, School of Pharmacy, Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran e-mail: gmehralian@gmail.com 123 Int J Clin Pharm (2014) 36:707–715 DOI 10.1007/s11096-014-9928-7