Description quality of nursing care for oncology patients as expressed by patients1 and their nurses' perspectives

ABSTRACT

Today's quality of nursing care for oncology patients' has always been a primary concern in the health care organization which reflects on rendering quality of nursing care. The vision of nursing is providing high quality nursing care, which related to the degree of patients' physical, psychological, and extra care needs were met. Quality of nursing care from views of patients and their nurses are not often involved in identifying components of quality. Studies on patients perspectives of health care quality and what quality nursing care means to them will contribute to a better understanding of how the public views quality of care and their expectations. Providers' perceptions of quality often differ from patients perspectives. From this view, the present study aimed to explore patients and nurses perspectives for describing quality of nursing care and also to determine whether patients perspectives are congruent with these of nurses. The study was conducted at Oncology Center-Mansoura University at two units included one medical and one surgical inpatient care units. Two groups of subjects comprised in the present study included nurses' and patients groups. Two tools were used for data collection. Questionnaire sheet is contained 40 items to investigate the perspectives of both study groups as regarding themes that describing quality of nursing care for oncology patient by using Oncology Patients Perceptions of the Quality of Nursing Care Scale [OPPQNCS]. The second tool was rating scale. Subjects were asked to rating scale of defined quality as their views. It included 6 items that concluded to ask [what dose quality nursing care mean to you?]. The study revealed that, there was a incompatibility between patients and nurses perspectives regarding themes quality of nursing care. And also there was a significant difference between two groups perspectives. Thus, it is recommended that perspectives of both patients and nurses represent the yardstick for identifying what are constitutes quality of nursing care. And also patients and nurses' perspectives are important in order to develop quality improvement programs