Patient safety culture and incidents recorded during nursing shift changes in intensive care units

OBJECTIVE: To analyze the association of patient safety culture perceived by nursing professionals with incidents recorded during nursing shifts in intensive care units. METHODS: This was a cross-sectional study that investigated patient safety culture measured by the Hospital Survey on Patient Safety Culture instrument. Descriptive statistics, chi-square tests, Student’s t-test and multiple linear regression models were analyzed considering a significance level of 5%. RESULTS: The study reported a mean of 3.1 (standard deviation of 0.4) for the culture of patient safety in the perception of nursing professionals and 480 incidents with and without damage recorded during the nursing shifts. The variables patient safety culture with a difference between means of 0.543 (95%CI 0.022 - 1.065; p < 0.05) and nursing assistants with a difference between means of -0.133 (95%CI -0.192 - -0.074; p < 0.05) were associated with the incidents recorded during the nursing shifts. Further, nursing assistants had a lower tendency to record incidents than did the nurses. CONCLUSION: The strengthening of the patient safety culture and the aspects tangential to the nursing professionals represent a possible target for interventions to encourage the recording of incidents during the nursing shift shifts and improve patient safety.