[Nurses' professionalism as a component of evaluation of parents/caregivers satisfaction with nursing care].

BACKGROUND Professionalism in nursing means the provision of medical and nursing services based on the best knowledge and skills, as well as on great responsibility for the undertaken actions. The opinions of patients and their families concerning professionalism, reflected in the level of satisfaction, contribute to the improvement of the quality of services offered. MATERIAL AND METHODS The study covered 120 parents/caregivers of children hospitalized in a pediatric ward. Diagnostic survey method was applied in the research. The standardized questionnaire for evaluation of the level of parents/caregivers satisfaction with nursing care (Latour et al.) adjusted to the conditions of Polish pediatric hospital services and subjected to validation was adopted as a research tool. Statistical analysis was performed using the Mann-Whitney U test and Kruskal-Wallis test. A value of p≤0.05 was considered to indicate statistical significance. The respondents were selected at random. The parents/caregivers received the questionnaire the day before the child's discharge. RESULTS The parents/caregivers generally evaluated the professionalism of nursing care in positive terms (4.3). They expressed higher satisfaction with respect showed by nurses for patients (4.7), while lower satisfaction with nurses introducing themselves (3.2). A high level of satisfaction was obtained with respect to the parents/caregivers' opinions pertaining to cooperation within a therapeutic team (4.6), organization of nurses' work (4.6), and quality of nursing care (4.6). CONCLUSIONS Parents/caregivers expressed their satisfaction with the professionalism of nursing care. Education of respondents, frequency and reasons for hospitalization among children proved to be the variables that significantly differed the opinions of parents/caregivers concerning the selected criteria for professionalism of nursing care. No correlation was found between the duration of hospitalization, children's age, place of parents/caregivers residence, and the level of satisfaction with professionalism of nursing care.