Patient satisfaction with nursing care: evaluation before and after expenditure cutback and intervention at a surgical clinic

After a major cutback in the budget and staffing of a surgical clinic in southern Sweden there was intervention to improve the quality of nursing care and to evaluate the outcome. The intervention consisted of the implementation of: (1) nursing care organized in such a way that it would secure continuity of the nurse—patient relationship, (2) individually planned care by means of diagnostic reasoning, and (3) quality assurance for aspects believed to be connected with quality of care. Patient satisfaction before and after the intervention was assessed by means of a patient questionnaire survey (May 1991; n = 105 and May 1992; n = 137). Patient satisfaction improved significantly in variables related to nursing care viz. overall satisfaction and satisfaction with information and decision making; satisfaction with contact and staff-patient relationship; ward facilities and physical treatment or examinations; and satisfaction with physical nursing care. The results were interpreted to mean that the intervention may have counteracted any negative impact the reduced budget might have had such as the higher patient turn-over and the shorter in-patient periods, and thus seemed to have improved the quality of the nursing care in terms of patient satisfaction.