Models of nursing care: a comparative study of patient satisfaction on two orthopaedic wards in Brisbane.

Patient satisfaction measures assist nurses in the evaluation of effectiveness of nursing practice and assist the process of improvement regarding established practice. A comparative study was carried out on 36 patients from a ward using team nursing (Model 1) and 38 patients from a ward using patient allocation (Model 2) in two orthopaedic wards of a 900 bed teaching hospital in Brisbane, Australia. The purpose of the research was to measure if differences in the levels of patient satisfaction were evident. The Patient Satisfaction Survey (Greenhill and Henderson 1997) used in this study encompassed aspects such as patients' feelings and perceptions; nurses' skills, behaviour and attitudes; nurses' communication and education skills; and continuity of care experienced. The results indicated that there were no differences between models of nursing care and levels of patient satisfaction. However, there were significant relationships between patient satisfaction and patients' characteristics such as age, education and health status.