Abstract
Session presented on: Thursday, July 25, 2013:
Purpose: Improving the quality of patient care is central to the proposed health care reforms in South Africa. This paper examines whether quality of care is supported by the activities of hospital nursing unit managers in South Africa, done as part of a larger project to examine the relationship between the quality of nursing unit management and quality of care in hospitals.
Methods: The overall project combined in-depth qualitative and quantitative methods, including reflective diaries, semi-structure interviews, record reviews and observation. As part of the latter, the activities of 36 unit managers in private and public hospitals in two South African provinces were recorded. Each unit manager was observed for a period of two hours a day and their activities recorded on a minute by minute basis. The data was coded into categories and analysed according to the time spent on activities in each category. Data validation was done through a workshop with unit managers and examining data from other the components.
Results: The study found that nursing unit managers spent 22% of their time on patient care. The remainder of the time was spent on patient administration (16%); staff management (15%), stock management (13%), support and communication (12%) and education (5%). Of concern was that nursing managers spent 17% of their time on miscellaneous activities, including tidying the ward, maintenance & support services; and meetings.
Conclusion: Although nursing unit managers are held responsible for the quality of patient care, their workloads, the range and diversity of activities as well as current work organisation, make it difficult for them to meet this responsibility. A combination of leadership training, better use of unit managers' time, internal agency and supportive supervision from executive nursing management is needed to enable the provision of consistent and high quality patient care.
Sigma Membership
Tau Lambda at-Large
Type
Presentation
Format Type
Text-based Document
Study Design/Type
N/A
Research Approach
N/A
Keywords:
Nursing Management, Quality of Care, Hospital Units
Recommended Citation
Rispel, Laetitia C., "Quality of patient care and the activities of hospital nursing unit managers in South Africa: A paradox?" (2013). INRC (Congress). 67.
https://www.sigmarepository.org/inrc/2013/presentations_2013/67
Conference Name
24th International Nursing Research Congress
Conference Host
Sigma Theta Tau International
Conference Location
Prague, Czech Republic
Conference Year
2013
Rights Holder
All rights reserved by the author(s) and/or publisher(s) listed in this item record unless relinquished in whole or part by a rights notation or a Creative Commons License present in this item record.
All permission requests should be directed accordingly and not to the Sigma Repository.
All submitting authors or publishers have affirmed that when using material in their work where they do not own copyright, they have obtained permission of the copyright holder prior to submission and the rights holder has been acknowledged as necessary.
Acquisition
Proxy-submission
Quality of patient care and the activities of hospital nursing unit managers in South Africa: A paradox?
Prague, Czech Republic
Session presented on: Thursday, July 25, 2013:
Purpose: Improving the quality of patient care is central to the proposed health care reforms in South Africa. This paper examines whether quality of care is supported by the activities of hospital nursing unit managers in South Africa, done as part of a larger project to examine the relationship between the quality of nursing unit management and quality of care in hospitals.
Methods: The overall project combined in-depth qualitative and quantitative methods, including reflective diaries, semi-structure interviews, record reviews and observation. As part of the latter, the activities of 36 unit managers in private and public hospitals in two South African provinces were recorded. Each unit manager was observed for a period of two hours a day and their activities recorded on a minute by minute basis. The data was coded into categories and analysed according to the time spent on activities in each category. Data validation was done through a workshop with unit managers and examining data from other the components.
Results: The study found that nursing unit managers spent 22% of their time on patient care. The remainder of the time was spent on patient administration (16%); staff management (15%), stock management (13%), support and communication (12%) and education (5%). Of concern was that nursing managers spent 17% of their time on miscellaneous activities, including tidying the ward, maintenance & support services; and meetings.
Conclusion: Although nursing unit managers are held responsible for the quality of patient care, their workloads, the range and diversity of activities as well as current work organisation, make it difficult for them to meet this responsibility. A combination of leadership training, better use of unit managers' time, internal agency and supportive supervision from executive nursing management is needed to enable the provision of consistent and high quality patient care.