Abstract
Background: Patient safety is a serious global public health issue. Estimates show that every day many patients are harmed while receiving hospital care. Health care staff plays a key role in providing quality and safe patient care, especially physicians who are main members of the medical team and a critical element in patient safety efforts. Objective: The current study used a Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) framework to investigate predictors of patient safety intentions and behavior of physicians. Methods: This descriptive analytical study was conducted in 8 hospitals with 52 physicians participating. A researcher-designed questionnaire was prepared to investigate patient safety behaviors and behavior constructs of physicians based on the guidelines of constructing a TPB Questionnaire: Conceptual and Methodological Considerations. The content validity and reliability of the questionnaire were confirmed. Binary logistic regression analysis was performed using SPSS 18 . Results: The total mean score of physician safety behavior indicated that 3.8±0.92. 42% of physicians reported their safety behavior at a good level. There was no significant difference between the patient safety function of physicians in public and private hospitals (P=0.8) and working in medical or surgical wards (P=0.4). Among TPB constructs, “normative beliefs” had the greatest influence on physician intention for safety behaviors (wald=3.828, P=0.05). Conclusion: The results showed that “normative beliefs” had the greatest influence on physician intention for safety behaviors; therefore, it seems that patient safety must be the most important concern of all health care staff, specifically managers and executives throughout health care centers.
Highlights
Patient safety is a serious global public health issue
Total mean score of safety behavior of physicians was reported as 3.8±0.92 and, as shown in Table 1, 42% of physicians reported their safety behavior as being at a good level
Calculating physicians mean scores in each variable of Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) indicated that respondents attained higher scores in the areas of perceived behavioral control, subjective norm, attitude, and intention (81.97±16.5) (Table 2)
Summary
Patient safety is a serious global public health issue. Estimates show that every day many patients are harmed while receiving hospital care. Health care staff plays a key role in providing quality and safe patient care, especially physicians who are main members of the medical team and a critical element in patient safety efforts. Among TPB constructs, “normative beliefs” had the greatest influence on physician intention for safety behaviors (wald=3.828, P=0.05). Conclusion: The results showed that “normative beliefs” had the greatest influence on physician intention for safety behaviors; it seems that patient safety must be the most important concern of all health care staff, managers and executives throughout health care centers. Health care staff play key roles in the quality and safety of patient care, especially physicians who are main members of the medical team and a critical element in patient safety efforts [4]. Information about the overall state of patient safety in developing countries is less well known due to the shortage of data [6]
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
