Hospital support measures from the perspective of infectious and non-infectious nurses caring for patients with COVID-19

As the functions of hospitals change during COVID-19 outbreak and due to lack of nurses’ experience, the development and implementation of special support programs in this regard seems necessary. The present study intended to assess the experienced nurses’ viewpoints in infectious and non-infectious wards regarding hospital support measures.

This cross-sectional descriptive study was performed in IMAMREZA hospital in Mashhad. All together 230nurses caring for COVID-19 patients working in infectious (group 1) and non-infectious (group 2) wards were selected through stratified random sampling. The research tool was a researcher-made questionnaire whose validity and reliability were examined and confirmed. The Data were analyzed by SPSS with Chi-square and Pearson correlation coefficients.

From the nurseschr('39') viewpoint, the highest satisfaction score was related to the reorganization of the hospital and the allocation of new ward (87.8%). The lowest was related to providing suitable accommodation for the medical staff (26.4%). Statistically significant differences were observed between the level of satisfaction with supportive measures in groups 1 and 2 in the areas related to education and information(P-Value=0.014), training on safety and care of coronary patients(P-Value=0.017) Possibility of receiving counseling and screening and timely dispatch of manpower(P-Value=0.018), supply and timely dispatch of manpower in the ward(P-Value=0.002) and reorganization of the hospital in accordance with the crisis (P-Value=0.002).

Considering the viewpoints of infectious and non-infectious nurses about the same supportive measures taken by the hospitals, managerschr('39') attention to the needs of hospitals’ nursing groups, especially during the crisis time, is suggested to increase job satisfaction.