The quality of care in Norwegian nursing homes.

BACKGROUND

Promoting the quality of life is an importing aim of the long-term care for the elderly, and the quality of life is related to quality of care (QoC). This way the QoC in nursing homes, and its correlates, is an interesting subject.

AIM

To describe to what degree Norwegian nursing homes provide services in line with the core areas of the 'regulation of care' and whether patient or ward characteristics are associated with the QoC.

METHODS AND MATERIAL

Cross-sectional study where data were collected in structured interview of the nursing staff in 251 wards regarding 1926 patients.

RESULTS

Most of the patients receive good basic care in Norwegian nursing homes, but taking part in leisure activities and having the opportunity to go out for a walk are more often neglected. Acceptable QoC had a strongly negative association with patient characteristics such as low function in mental capacity, low function in activities of daily living and aggressive behaviour. In most of the measured areas of QoC, ward characteristics, such as type of ward, size of ward and staffing ratio, do have an influence on QoC.