An evaluation of the quality of nursing care in orthopaedic units

SummaryThe purpose of this study was to evaluate the quality of nursing care of three categories of orthopaedic patients and compare the quality scores on four objectives and 24 sub-objectives. The four main objectives were:1.The plan of nursing care was formulated;2.The physical needs of the patient were attended;3.The psycho-social-cultural-spiritual needs of the patient were attended;4.Achievement of nursing care objectives was evaluated.One hundred and eighty orthopaedic patients were randomly selected from two orthopaedic units of the teaching hospital in the eastern region of Taiwan. The quality monitor tools were modified from Orthopaedic Nursing Care Quality monitor tools developed by Hsu et al. (2002). Results showed the mean quality achievement percentage scores of the main objectives were 85.91%, 85.84%, 80.11%, and 89.47%, respectively. The priority in achievement of nursing care objectives and the plan of nursing care were higher than the physical needs of the patient and the psycho-social-culture-spiritual needs of the patient. The use of this tool to evaluate the quality of nursing care will assist administrators and educators to identify the strengths and weakness in the delivery of nursing care.