Patients' perception of quality of nursing care; a tertiary center experience from Ethiopia

Nursing care closely influences patients' satisfaction with the overall quality of care, and the importance of measuring patient satisfaction with nursing care cannot be emphasized enough. Data are however scarce regarding patients' perception of quality of nursing care in Ethiopia. We performed this study to assess patient's perception of the quality of nursing care in a tertiary center in Ethiopia.

Data were collected prospectively using Quality of Nursing Care Questionnaires-patient of Safford & Schlotfeldt. A total of 340 patients were included using systematic random sampling and data were analyzed using SPSS for windows version- 20.

The nursing care performance was highest for nurse-physician relation (mean = 3.95) and low for education and home care preparation and physical care (mean score of 2.79 and 2.89 respectively). The emotional care and nurse administration mean score were 3.5 and 3.83 respectively. The overall nursing quality was neither satisfying nor dissatisfying (mean of 3.39). While only 36% of the respondents were satisfied with the nursing care, patient education has the strongest (AOR of 7.4) association with satisfaction.

Patients perceived low quality of physical care, education and preparation for home care but better nurse-physician relation and nursing administration. However the overall quality measure was neither satisfying nor dissatisfying. This calls for an action from the health care administrators, educators and other stakeholders to improve the patient perception of quality nursing care.