A study of the communication skills in health care and the role of demographic variables (a case study of the nurses at the Educational, Therapeutic and Research Center of Imam Reza Hospital, Kermanshah, Iran in 2018)

• Published in: Journal of public health Vol. 29; no. 2; pp. 361 - 367
• Main Authors: Zangeneh, Alireza, Lebni, Javad Yoosefi, Azar, Farbod Ebadi Fard, Sharma, Manoj, Kianipour, Neda, Azizi, Seyyed Amar, Saeidi, Shahram, Ziapour, Arash
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 01.04.2021; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Case studies; Communication; Communication skills; Continuing education; Data analysis; Data collection; Demographic variables; Demographics; Employment; Epidemiology; Health care; Health Promotion and Disease Prevention; Mean; Medical personnel; Medical research; Medicine; Medicine & Public Health; Nurses; Nursing; Nursing care; Original Article; Population (statistical); Population studies; Public Health; Random sampling; Research centers; Research facilities; Sampling; Sampling methods; Statistical sampling; Statistics; Training; Variance analysis; Iran; Conversational skills; Nursing; Health worker; Iran
• ISSN: 2198-1833; 1613-2238
• DOI: 10.1007/s10389-019-01126-9

Purpose Nurses, as facilitators in hospitals, should be equipped with communication skills towards the realization of this goal. The present study aimed to investigate the status of communication skills in health care and the role of nurses’ demographic variables at the Educational, Therapeutic, and Research Center of Imam Reza Hospital, Kermanshah, Iran in 2018. Methods In this descriptive–analytic study, the statistical population was 926 nurses working at the Educational, Therapeutic, and Research Center of Imam Reza Hospital affiliated to Kermanshah University of Medical Sciences, Kermanshah, Iran in 2018. Moreover, the random sampling was used as the sampling method. As for data collection, a two-part questionnaire, containing the demographic questions and the Queendom Communication Skills Test, was used. Furthermore, the independent t -test and one-way ANOVA using SPSS Statistical Software Version 22.0 were used for data analysis. Results The results of the present study demonstrated that the mean and standard deviation of the total score of communication skills measured 2.70 ± 0.43. The results also indicated that assertiveness and understanding verbal and nonverbal messages had the highest and lowest mean scores (3.20 ± 0.64 and 2.30 ± 0.58 respectively). Further, there was a significant relationship between the mean scores of communication skills and variables such as marital status, employment background, department, work shift, and type of employment ( P  < 0.05). Conclusions The results of the present study revealed that nurses’ knowledge of communication skills was moderate. Therefore, it is recommended that courses on communication skills training be considered in their continuing education and on-the-job training, with the aim of improving the quality of nursing care.