The quality of patient-nurse communication perceived before and during the COVID-19 pandemic: an Italian pilot study

BACKGROUND AND AIM OF THE WORK. Therapeutic communication is essential for assessing the quality of patients’ care. The present study aimed to assess how the forced use of the mask influenced the communication before and during the Covid-19 pandemic. METHODS. An online questionnaire was administered including two socio-demographic items, such as sex, as male and female, and role, as nurse or patient, and the Quality of Communication Questionnaire (QOC) for twice, referring to the period before and during the pandemic. RESULTS. 178 subjects participated in the study, of which 60 (33.7%) were patients and 118 (66.3%) were nurses. During the pandemic, patients reported no significant differences in the perception of the quality of nurse-patient communication. While nurses recorded a lower perception of communication quality during the pandemic period than before. CONCLUSIONS. The patient willingly accepted the use of the face mask unlike nurses considered it a further obstacle to an effective communication between nurse-patient. However, it could be considered the emotional and caring overload that each nurse had stored during the Covid-19 pandemic, in addition to the fear of contagion that had gripped the lives of nurses on a daily basis.