Patients' Expectations and Satisfaction with Nursing Care, and Their Nurses' Awareness of Their Expectations
Open Access
- Author:
- Reck, Donna Hart
- Graduate Program:
- Nursing
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- June 14, 2010
- Committee Members:
- Dr Paula Milone Nuzzo, Dissertation Advisor/Co-Advisor
Paula F Milone Nuzzo, Committee Chair/Co-Chair
Judith E Hupcey, Committee Member
Vernon Michael Chinchilli, Committee Member
James Truman Ziegenfuss Jr., Committee Member - Keywords:
- patient satisfaction with nursing care
descriptive correlational mixed-method design
nurrse-patient relationship
patients’ expectations
nurses’ assessments of patients’ expectations - Abstract:
- This study of patient satisfaction with nursing care operationalized patients’ expectations for their nursing care as the care they anticipated receiving during their present hospitalization from their actual nurses, rather than as the level of care they imagined they would receive in the ideal hospital setting, which was how patients’ expectations have been operationalized in past studies. This study also examined whether nurses’ assessments of their patients’ expectations correlated with the patients’ reports of their expectations. A descriptive correlational mixed-method research design was used to examine the relationships between two predictor variables (patients’ expectations before hospitalization, and nurses’ assessments of patients’ expectations of care) and the outcome variable (patient satisfaction with nursing care). The existing Patient Satisfaction with Nursing Care Quality Questionnaire was modified to create a questionnaire to measure patients’ expectations with nursing care (Patient Expectations for Nursing Care Quality Questionnaire) and one to measure nurses’ assessments of their patients’ expectations (Nurse’s Assessment of the Patient’s Expectations Questionnaire). The qualitative portion of this study was based on data obtained from a subgroup of the initial patients’ responses to four open-ended questions regarding their nursing-care experience. The convenience sample for the study consisted of 109 patient-nurse dyads at an academic medical center. The target patient population consisted of patients hospitalized with an anticipated length of stay of two or more days. In each dyad, the nurse was the nurse who cared for the patient. The study found no relationship between nurses’ assessments of patients’ expectations and patients’ ratings of their own expectations, or between nurses’ assessments of patients’ expectations and patients’ satisfaction. There was, however, a moderate relationship between patients’ expectations and satisfaction, and the meaning of the relationship was considered. The qualitative comments were consistent with the quantitative results and both types of data support the same conclusion about the patients’ experiences. A significant outcome of this study was the development of a measure that allows patients to rate their expectations for nursing care and another measure that allowed nurses to give their assessment of patients’ expectations.