The relationship between professional communication competences and nursing performance of critical care nurses in South Korea.

BACKGROUND

Ineffective communication of critical care nurses can lead to higher levels of burnout and negatively affect quality of patient care and patient outcomes such as higher mortality.

AIM

The purpose of this study is to describe the relationship between professional communication competences and nursing performance of critical care nurses in South Korea.

METHOD

This cross-sectional study collected data on 197 intensive care unit staff nurses in 3 tertiary academic medical centres in South Korea from July to November 2014.

RESULTS

In the hierarchical regression analysis, the professional communication competences were the only significant predictors of nursing performance after adjusting for sociodemographic characteristics. In addition, the greater professional communication competences of nurses were associated with being older and having a higher education level, more years of overall clinical and intensive care unit experience, and a higher monthly salary.

CONCLUSION

Our findings indicate that communication skills-related training should be included in the practical education to improve nursing performance for the quality of intensive care. Further research is needed to identify the comprehensive factors on professional communication competences of nurses in intensive care units.