Correlation between psychophysiological response and hospital management model for nurses involved in medication errors

Abstract

Because hospitals in Taiwan now place a lot of emphasis on hospital accreditation, leading to a heavy workload for nurses, nurses are unintentional involved in patient medication errors (MEs). In this research, we explore the possible correlation between psychophysiological responses of nursing staff and a hospital management model regarding MEs. We conducted a cross-sectional study design in one hospital in central Taiwan. A total of 345 nurses at Tali Jen-Ai Hospital l were selected. A questionnaire was chosen as the study instrument. The questionnaire asked the following information: basic data, classification of MEs, frequency and severity of psychophysiological responses, and information about the hospital’s management model and support system. We found that the hospital management model had a significant negative correlation with the frequency of physiological symptoms (r = -0.14, p < .01). Likewise, the support system also had a substantial negative correlation with the scores of the physiological symptom, behavioral responses, and psychophysiological responses. Using multiple regression analysis adjusted for work duration, job title, and degree of injury, we found that the support system was significantly correlated with the nurses’ psychophysiological responses. Both the hospital management and the support system decreased the psychophysiological responses of the nurses. Therefore, we recommend that supervisors implement a management strategy to deal specifically with MEs. When nurse managers have frequently empathy and no-blame attitude to replace disrespectful or skeptical ways to nurse with ME, they will empower their enthusiasm and responsibility to improve the reduction of ME.