Nursing perceptions about safety culture as a local phenomenon

Abstract

Background: Patient safety culture is the product of values and beliefs, attitudes, perceptions, competencies, and individual and collective behaviour patterns that determine the organizational commitment to quality and patient safety. Aim: To determine the nursing staff perception of the institutional culture of patient safety. Design and Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted in Mollet Hospital, Spain, in 2018-2019. The HSOPSC questionnaire was used for data collection across different hospital areas with presence of nursing staff. The sampling was for convenience and included all the nurses who worked at the hospital at the time of data collection (n=244). Univariate and bivariate data analysis was performed using Jamovi software. Findings: No dimension had a frequency of positive responses of 75% or higher, so we cannot classify any as a strength. Regarding the unit, we found significant differences in several dimensions. Conclusion: Perception of nursing staff culture of safety was considered weak, with significant differences between professional's variables studied. Variation between different healthcare units confirmed that patient safety culture is a specific local phenomenon and that it may be better focused on improving the local culture in each department. Our findings suggest the need to develop different strategies to improve patient safety culture in each specific care unit.