Hospital service quality based on HEALTHQUAL model and trusting nurses at Iranian university and non-university hospitals: a comparative study

BACKGROUND: Establishment and improvement of patients’ trust in healthcare organizations like hospitals necessitate delivery of high-quality services by nurses, as the largest group of healthcare providers. The present study aimed to compare hospital service quality based on the HEALTHQUAL model and trusting nurses at university and non-university hospitals in Iran. METHODS: This comparative cross-sectional study was conducted on 990 patients admitted to university and non-university hospitals located in Bushehr Province, southern Iran, who were selected using the stratified random sampling method. The data were collected through the HEALTHQUAL questionnaire and the Trust in Nurses Scale, and then analyzed via the SPSS Statistics software (version 22) as well as the General Linear Model (GLM) univariate procedure and the Chi-square test with a significance level of 0.05. RESULTS: The study findings revealed that the mean values of real quality (perceptions) and ideal quality (expectations) were 3.89 ± 0.69 and 4.55 ± 0.47, respectively. The gap between the real and ideal quality (− 0.64) was also larger at non-university hospitals from the patients’ viewpoints. Comparing various dimensions of service quality, the largest gap at university and non-university hospitals was associated with “environment” (− 0.13) and “empathy” (− 0.18), respectively. Additionally, the mean scores of the patient trust in nurses at university and non-university hospitals were 10.34 ± 5.81 and 8.71 ± 4.05, respectively, being a statistically significant difference (p < 0.001). CONCLUSION: The study results demonstrated that hospital service quality and trusting in nurses were at higher levels at the university hospital than the non-university one; however, hospital service quality was at a lower level than what the patients had expected. Accordingly, hospital managers and policy-makers were suggested to focus on patients to reduce gaps in service quality, to promote service quality, and to provide better healthcare services to patients. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12912-020-00513-y.