Relational coordination between professionals predicts satisfaction with home visit nursing care

Abstract

The authors aimed to identify the relationship between relational coordination among home visit nurses and other home healthcare workers and nursing care satisfaction. In November 2013, the authors collected data from 190 nurses in 34 of 64 home visit nursing agencies in Miyazaki prefecture, Japan. Data were returned by 119 individuals through a web-based or mail survey. Nursing care satisfaction among their clients during the most recent 6 months was evaluated by primary nurses (possible scores: 0-10), based on which the authors created a low-satisfaction (Low-SG) and a high-satisfaction (High-SG) group. Nurses’ relational coordination with nursing colleagues, nursing managers, clinicians, care managers, and home helpers was measured with the Relational Coordination Scale Japanese version (Relational Coordination Scale Japanese version [RCS-J]; possible scores: 1-5). Multivariate logistic regression analysis was used to analyze the data. Using data from 90 nurses because of missing data, the RCS-J scores were 3.5 (standard deviation [SD] = 0.6) and 3.8 (SD = 0.5) for Low-SG and High-SG groups, respectively. Multivariate logistic regression analysis showed that RCS-J scores were positively associated with nursing care satisfaction (odds ratio [OR] = 3.05, 95% confidence interval: 1.25-7.45). Further, nurse's age was positively associated with nursing care satisfaction (OR = 1.10, 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.02-1.18). This finding suggests that well-coordinated home healthcare teams provide higher quality of care than do poor-coordinated teams. However, the results depended on nurses’ self-reports. Future research using a more objective index of quality of care would contribute to understanding the benefits of relational coordination.