Clients' perspective : guidelines for assessing the quality of leprosy services from the clients' point of view

Every year several hundreds of thousands new leprosy patients are detected. Since transmission in high endemic countries has not been substantially interrupted, considerable numbers of leprosy patients will continue to report to health facilities in the coming years. Hence, it is crucial that adequate health services are provided to leprosy patients. To ensure that such services remain of good quality, feedback from patients, i.e. the ‘clients’ of the health services, is essential. Assessing their experiences and identifying their constraints, as illustrated in the above examples, can help in the further improvement of leprosy services.