Managerial and moral obstacles in reporting nursing errors: nurse's view point

Although errors in health services are harmful and the consequences might be irreversible in some situations، none of the health care providers are free of errors. Since health provision is the main goal of the nursing care، it is important to report professional errors in order to reach this goal. However، there are many obstacles in reporting nursing errors that should be identified and solved. The present study tried to evaluate the nurses’ point of view about managerial and moral obstacles in expressing nursing errors. Two hundred and one nurses of the educational hospitals of Sabzevar University of Medical Sciences were enrolled in this descriptive analytic study. The students were selected by convenience sampling method and the study data was collected using a questionnaire that consisted of a demographic part and a researcher made part with 13 and 27 questions related to managerial and moral obstacles respectively. Content validity index and reliability were measured by internal consistency (α = 80) and test-retest (r = 0. 84). Data analysis was done by SPSS 18 software. The results of this study showed that the main reported managerial obstacle in reporting nursing errors was endangerment of academic position (43. 3%)، and the main moral obstacle was losing physicians'' support (55. 2%). Thus this problem might be solved by designing appropriate plans from both managerial and moral points of view.