Survey of the Patient Safety Culture: Nurses' Perceptions in Teaching Hospitals of Urmia University of Medical Sciences, 2011.

Abstract

Abstract: Introduction: Safety culture is considered as an important factor in improving patient safety. Therefore, a safety culture assessment provides an organization with a basic understanding of the safety related perceptions and attitudes of its managers and staffs. Because there are many potential starting points for improvement efforts, a safety culture assessment can help an organization to provide material for further analysis and for generating improvement ideas from staff directly involved in the issues. Methods: The present descriptive study included 940 nurses working in four training hospitals affiliated with Urmia University of Medical Sciences (Iran). Data was collected through the self –report AHRQ's questionnaire. Descriptive (number, percent, mean, and standard deviation) and inferential (t test and analysis of variance) statistics were used to analyze the data in SPSS. Results: Our study demonstrated the overall average positive response rate for the 12 patient safety culture dimensions of the HSOPSC survey was 55.34%, whereas that was 58.82% in unit –level aspects of safety culture, 52.27% in outcome variables and was 54.95% in hospital level aspects of safety culture. The findings of the present study revealed that there was a significant correlation of nurses' perceptions of patient safety culture with marital status, working hours per month and type of hospital (p<0.05). Conclusion: The results of this study suggest that Urmia Teaching Hospitals has area for improvement with regard to nurses' perception of safety culture on multiple units. In addition, AHRQ's survey as used for this study may serve as a beginning measure of safety culture in hospital of Iran.