A survey on nurses’ perception of the importance of caring behaviors and factors affecting its provision

Background: Caring is the essence of nursing practice, but has been understood in various countries in a different way. Analysis of nurses’ perception of caring behaviors provides the possibility to nursing teachers and administrators to be able to plan a program to meet all the patients’ needs with an inclusive view. Aim: to determine nurses’ perception about caring behaviors and the factors that may affect those behaviors. Method: In this cross- sectional study, 189 Registered Nurses who were selected through Quota sampling from four teaching hospitals of Urmia city were included. Data Collection was carried out using a self-structured three-part questionnaire. Data were analyzed using descriptive tests and multivariate linear regression analysis with SPSS version 16. Results: The highest caring behavior score was related to writing nursing reports and the lowest score to the helping to patients in their physical activity in daily life. Multivariate regression analysis showed that the sense of responsibility towards patients, sense of personal achievement due to nursing profession, belief in delivering high quality care and  personal problems of nurses explained the variance in caring behaviors. Conclusion: In order to consider all the patients’ needs, social - emotional aspects of caring is needed to be more emphasized in nursing education and planning. To highlight moral issues, creating moral and enhancing counseling services can lead to increased sense of responsibility, promoted professional ethics and self efficacy which itself resulted in decreased nurses’ personal problems.