How does overall hospital satisfaction relate to patient experience with nursing care? a cross-sectional study in China

OBJECTIVE: To determine how patient experience with nursing care influence patient satisfaction with overall hospital services. DESIGN: This was a cross-sectional study. SETTING: Inpatients were consecutively recruited at the national hospital (with 2000 beds) in Shanghai, China. PARTICIPANTS: The inclusion criteria were as follows: (1) hospitalised for 2 days or more; (2) able to read and understand Chinese; and (3) aged 18 years old or above. Patients with mental health problems were excluded. 756 patient surveys distributed among 36 wards were analysed. The mean age of participants in the study was 57.7 (SD=14.5) and ranged from 18 to 80 years. Most participants were men (61.5%) and ever married (94.6%). PRIMARY AND SECONDARY OUTCOME MEASURES: Patient experience with nursing care, meaning the sum of all interactions between patients and nurses, was measured using the self-designed questionnaire, which was developed by patient interviews, literature analysis and expert consultation. The overall patient satisfaction question was measured with a 10-point response option ranging from 1 to 10. RESULTS: A linear relationship between the patient experience with nursing care and overall patient satisfaction was observed. The patient experience with nursing care was significantly associated with overall satisfaction in the crude model and in the adjusted models. Even after adjusting for six sociodemographic and three disease-related factors, the patient experience with nursing care explained 34.9% of the variation in overall patient satisfaction. CONCLUSIONS: This study showed that patient experience with nursing care was an important predictor for overall patient satisfaction.